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Social  Sciences  &  Humanities  Library 

University  of  California,  San  Diego 
Please  Note:  This  item  is  subject  to  recall. 

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CI  39  (2/95)                                                                       UCSD  Lit. 

:J^ 


THE 

AMERICAN  PROTECTIONIST'S 

MANUAL. 
Protection  to  Home  Industry 

Essential  to  Natioxal  Independence  and  to  the  Well- 
being  OP  THE  People. 

British  Free  Trade 

A  Delusion  and  a  Peril. 


GILES  B.  STEBBINS, 

DETROIT,  MICH. 


DETROIT  : 

THORNDIKE    NOURSE. 

1883. 


Copyright, 
By  GILES  B.  STEBBINS. 

1883. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

Introductory.  The  Tariff  Question  Simple. — Tariff 
revision.  How  more  important  than  how  much.  How 
long  shall  protective  duties  last  ?  Ad  valorem  rates  not 
best 1 

CHAPTER  n. 

What  is  Protection?  What  is  Free  Trade  ? — Protec- 
tion not  a  "  Chinese  wall "  or  a  panacea 9 

CHAPTER  in. 
Varied  Industry  a  Help  to  Civilization 13 

CHAPTER  IV. 
Protection  Abroad.     Europe  not  Free  Trade    ...      19 

CHAPTER  V 

British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. — Monopoly  of  all  mar- 
kets. "A  free  trade  tariff"  a  false  claim.  Reaction 
against  free  trade  in  England.  British  intermeddling. 
The  Cobden  Club.  We  must  jjrotest.  English  contrib- 
utors to  free  trade  funds  in  New  York.  Early  fears  of 
oui"  manufactures.     Hands  off! .        24 


CHAPTER  VI. 

The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  that  a  Protective  Tariff 
IS  A  Tax  on  the  Consumer  Refuted. — Alexander  Ham- 
ilton. Cottons.  Silks.  Woolens  and  wool.  Honorable 
ignorance.  Cheap  woolens.  British  factory  life.  British 
shoddy.  The  poor  farmer  and  his  blankets.  Flannels, 
etc.  Iron  and  steel.  Steel  rails,  nails,  saws,  axes,  cut- 
lery, salt,  lumber.  Loose  and  reckless  assertions.  "Con- 
solations of  the  protected  farmer; "  a  Canadian  view. 
Chemicals.  Farmers  the  greatest  monopolists,  the  non- 
sense of  it 47 

CHAPTER  VII. 

A  Tariff  for  Revenue  Only,  Taxes  the  Consumer. 
Duties  and  prices.     The  old  store  and  the  new.     A  tariff 
like  a  levee  or  a  fence.    Why  do  we  not  export  manufac- 
tures largely? :     .     .       8& 

CHAPTER  VIII. 

Some  Free  Trade  Fallacies  Answered. — "Protection 
fetters  trade."  "Hotbed  growth."  "  Buy  in  the  cheapest 
market. "  ' '  Cheap  foreign  articles  are  clear  gain. "  "  Bal- 
ance of  trade  fallacious  "... 93^ 

CHAPTER  IX. 

Protection  and  the  Farmer. — Old  time  experiences — sell 
ing  cheap  and  buying  dear.  Wise  industrial  policy  needed 
for  successful  farming.  Rich  lands  exhausted.  Farm 
and  factory  neighbors  and  allies.  Purchasing  power  of 
farmers.  Cheap  transportation.  Address  of  E.  B.  Ward. 
The  Western  protectionist  and  the  Cobden  Club  man; 
Dudley  on  Mongredien.  Duties  on  farm  products.  Grain 
and  provisions ;  exports  and  home  market.  A  healthy 
equilibrium.  Foreign  markets  uncertain.  How  pro- 
tection protects  farmere.     A  farmer's  statement    ...       99 


Ill 


CHAPTER  X. 

Wages  and  Protection. — Wages  and  costs,  here  and  in  Eng- 
land, etc.  Savings  Bank  deposits;  seven  to  one.  Woman's 
elevation.  Wages  in  Newark,  Paisley  and  the  Clyde 
•ship-yards.  J.  W.  Hinton.  Comparative  taxes.  State- 
ments at  New  York  and  Chicago  Tariff  Conventions   .     .    130 

CHAPTER  XI. 
Opinions  of  Eminent  Men 153 

CHAPTER  XII. 

Common  Interest,  Not  Sectional  or  Class  Jealousy. — 
New  England  industries.  The  new  South.  A  Western 
view 163 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

Our  History  Teaches  the  Benefits  of  Protection. — 
Protective  tariffs  pay  surest  and  best  revenue  ....      179 

CHAPTER  XIV 
Foreign  Commerce — American  Ships.    Conclubioh     .     188 


CHAPTER  I. 

INTRODUCTORY— THE  TARIFF  QUESTION  SKUPLE. 

We  have  no  brief  compendium  for  popular  use, 
including  a  broad  discussion  of  protection  to  home 
industry,  criticism  of  free  trade  assertions  and  the- 
ories, and  exposure  of  the  delusion  and  peril  of  British 
free  trade.  Large  volumes  and  valuable  essays  and 
tracts  have  had  wide  reading,  but  a  condensed  manual 
is  wanted.  This  book  aims  to  supply  that  want,  and  to 
present  the  leading  principles  and  facts  on  this  great 
question  in  such  compass  as  to  be  readable  and  useful 
in  the  homes  of  the  people,  in  libraries,  and  as  a  help  in 
discussions.  A  generation  has  passed  away  since  the 
great  discussion  of  the  tariff  in  the  days  of  Henry  Clay 
and  Horace  Greeley,  and  there  are  now  many  who 
want  information  to  gain  more  jDositive  and  clear  views 
and  opinions.  There  are  protectionists  and  free  traders, 
equally  sincere  and  earnest  in  their  opposite  opinions, 
yet  wishing  more  light.  A  (piestion  so  imjjortant  and 
prominent  deserves  careful  thought  and  serious  atten- 
tion. The  statements  of  this  work  are  offered  as  helps 
to  all  these  classes.  Its  plain  criticisms  ,expose  the 
methods  and  aims  of  leading  free  trade  advocates, 
and  cut  across  the  grain  of  strong  prejudices,  but  they 
do  not  impugn  the  honesty  of  well-meaning  and  sincere 
free  traders. 

Many  of  our  college  professors  and  text- books  favor 
free  trade.  These  teachers  often  lack  practical  knowl- 
edge of  the  world,  and  are  captivated  by  fine  English 


2  Int/roductory. 

theories,  which  are  easy  to  accept,  and  save  the  trouble 
of  studying  the  facts  of  our  industrial  history,  as  given 
by  Carey,  Elder,  Thompson,  Bowen,  Kelley  and  other 
able  Americans,  or  like  facts  and  ideas  in  the  writings 
of  Sir  Edward  Sullivan,  Sir  Matthew  Byles,  Thiers, 
Frederick  List  and  other  eminent  foreigners.  But 
there  are  signs  of  a  change.  In  Yale  and  elsewhere 
students  are  calling  for  light  on  protection  to  American 
industry. 

The  tariff  question  is  supposed  by  many  to  be  abstruse 
and  difficult,  a  labyrinth  of  facts  and  figures  to  which 
none  can  find  a  clue  except  the  few  who  can  give  it  long 
and  patient  study.  This  is  a  mistake ;  the  principles 
involved  are  plain  and  simple.  It  is  thought  of  as  a  dry 
matter  of  dollars  and  dimes  in  the  national  treasury,  and 
of  profit  and  loss  to  gi-eat  capitalists;  or  as  a  soulless 
thing  galvanized  into  life  now  ajid  then  as  the  war-cry 
of  a  political  campaign.  It  is  full  of  vital  interest  and 
comes  home  to  the  daily  life  of  the  people.  Political 
economy  and  social  science  should  be  more  studied. 
Surely  what  pertains  so  closely  to  the  peaceful  industries 
which  so  largely  fill  our  time  should  be  as  well  under- 
stood as  the  poor  quarrels  of  old  kings  with  their  minis- 
ters or  mistresses,  or  the  wars  that  have  worse  than 
wasted  the  strength  of  the  human  race. 

A  family  pays  special  regard  to  the  interests  of  its 
own  members,  while  not  oppressing  cr  nlusing  others  : 
a  nation  is  a  great  family.  A  fan:ily  earns  its  own 
expenses,  or  more,  or  decays  ;  a  nation  sells  as  much  as 
it  buys  or  decays.  This  is  "the  balance  -f  trade." 
When  any  one  can  show  how  a  family  can  earn  §'900  and 
pay  out  $1,000  yearly,  and  still  prosper,  we  may  see  how 
a  nation  can  export  $90,000,000  and  import  $100,000,000 
yearly,  and  not  grow  poor. 


The  Tariff  Question  Simple.  3 

A  family,  the  members  of  which  toil  and  care  for  each 
other,  cannot  be  expected  to  admit  others,  who  do  not 
share  these  cares,  into  all  its  privileges  and  immunities ; 
and  none  complain  if  its  first  and  nearest  aim  is  to  see 
that  its  own  members  are  well  employed  and  in  a  way  to 
independence.  A  nation,  whose  people  have  cleared  its 
lands,  built  its  mills  and  shops  and  mechanism,  opened 
its  beds  of  ores  and  coal,  and  are  paying  its  debts  and 
taxes,  cannot  be  expected  to  admit  foreigners,  who  have 
no  share  in  these  tasks  or  burthens,  to  its  markets  on 
equal  terms  with  its  own  citizens.  A  tariff  is  a  means 
of  asking  them  to  pay  reasonably  for  the  privilege  of 
bringing  in  their  products,  and  at  the  same  time  of 
building  up  home  industries,  and  giving  employ  and 
independence  to  the  people.  Nothing  abstruse  or  com- 
plicated in  all  this. 

We  are  to  look  at  this  protective  tariff  matter  as  it  is 
practiced  now,  and  as  it  now  affects  people  and  nations, 
^especially  our  own  country — going  back  to  the  past  for 
such  facts  as  may  help  to  comprehend  the  present.  In 
the  dark  ages  of  personal  government  by  royal  despots 
■exclusive  privileges  of  making,  or  dealing  in,  salt, 
woolens,  etc.,  were  farmed  out  to  favorites.  The  people 
had  no  rights,  their  interest  was  not  counted,  the  only 
question  was,  how  much  extortion  will  they  bear  ? 

Wealth  was  won  by  the  sword,  and  the  rude  loom 
and  the  poor  tillage  of  the  soil  was  left  to  women  and 
slaves,  and  to  the  lame  and  halt  not  fit  to  be  soldiers. 
Duties  were  levied,  now  and  then,  on  exports  or  imports, 
with  no  thought  or  care  for  anything  save  to  raise 
money.  Tariffs  for  revenue  only,  advocated  by  modern 
free  traders,  are  relics  of  the  barbaric  ignorance  of  those 
dark  days  when  the  artificer  was  despised  and  the  robber 
warrior  exalted. 


4  Introductory. 

Then  came  slowly  a  recognition  of  the  national  import- 
ance of  biulcling  up  great  industries,  and  legislation  to 
that  end.  England,  for  instance,  had  a  rigid  system  of 
tariffs  for  centuries,  highly  protective  and  with  special 
prohibitions  such  as  no  country  to-day  would  enact. 
The  influence  of  legislation  on  the  people  fortunately 
enters  more  into  the  governmental  acts  of  all  civilized 
nations  now  than  in  the  past,  and  especially  is  that  the 
case  in  this  republican  country.  By  that  test  is  this 
matter  to  be  tried.  If  our  protective  tariff'  system  Avorks 
for  the  benefit  of  favored  manufacturers,  giving  wealthy 
capitalists  unjust  monopolies  and  privileges  at  the  cost 
of  their  employees  and  of  the  people,  helping  to  enrich 
the  few  at  the  expense  of  tlie  many,  it  is  not  fit  to  live  a 
day.  If  it  helps  to  build  uj?  gi-eat  and  varied  domestic 
industries ;  to  employ  labor  at  higher  wages  than  else- 
where ;  to  perfect  and  cheapen  the  products  of  our  mills 
by  a  healthy  competition;  to  open  a  larger  and  better 
home  market  for  our  farmers ;  to  develop  ojir  great 
natural  resources ;  to  furnish  revenue  to  our  govern- 
ment ;  to  help  our  financial  and  industrial  independ- 
ence, and  to  enrich  and  enlarge  the  daily  thought  and 
life  of  the  people,  it  should  be  sustained.  All  these 
benefits,  it  is  claimed,  result  from  it. 

TARIFF   REVISIOK. 

The  tariff  framed  in  1861 — largely  by  the  patient  care> 
of  Hon.  Justin  S.  Morrill,  U.  S.  S.,  of  Vermont,  a  man 
of  eminent  capacity  and  integrit}"^ — and  modified  after 
the  close  of  tlic  war,  in  1870,  has  done  excellent  service, 
helping  us  through  war  and  world-wide  business  panic. 
During  this  time  we  have  readied  a  magnitude  of  liome 
production  on  the  farm,  in  the  factory,  and  in  domestic 


The  Tariff  Question  Simple.  5 

and  foreign  trade,  increasing  beyond  like  growth  in 
any  other  country  or  any  iDre\dous  increase  in  the  same 
time  at  home.  As  changes  in  our  condition  seemed  to 
call  for  its  revision,  a  tariff'  commission  was  chosen  l)y 
the  President  in  188"^,  made  up  of  nine  practical  and 
able  men,  outside  of  Congress,  who  were  to  investigate 
the  whole  matter  and  report  facts  and  opinions  to  Con- 
gress, their  report  (which  was  made  December  4,  1883, 
and  is  of  permanent  value)  to  be  information  and  advis- 
ory basis  for  final  legislation  by  that  body,  that  its  work 
might  be  broad  and  comprehensive,  so  well  done  as  to 
.stand  for  a  term  of  years,  to  avoid  the  trouble  and  disas- 
ter of  frequent  changes  and  fragmentary  tariff  tinkering, 
and  give  that  stability  which  we  need  for  safety  in  in- 
•dustrial  enterprises.  Such  revision  was  approved  and 
asked  for  by  leading  producers  and  manufacturers. 
During  the  sessions  of  the  Forty-sixth  Congress  257 
large  manufacturing  companies  and  80,867  workmen 
:sent  petitions  to  that  body  asking  the  appointment  of 
isuch  commissioners.  It  is  not  in  the  scope  of  this  work 
to  comment  on  the  action  of  Congress  in  the  tariff'  bill 
passed  in  the  last  days  of  their  session  just  closed.  Thia 
much  only  can  be  said  :  Any  changes,  either  of  reduc- 
tion or  increase,  which  kept  the  idea  of  just  protection 
in  view  were  wise  ;  any  changes  ignoring  it  were  unwise. 

HOW    MOKE   IMPORTANT   THAN"    HOW    MUCH. 

The  German  revenue  from  customs  duties,  a  little  less 
in  amount  than  the  English,  is  levied  by  a  protective 
tariff.  Such  a  tariff'  discrijuinates  in  favor  of  the  people 
■of  the  country  whe?'e  it  is  framed.  A  tariff  for  revenue 
only  discriminates  against  them  and  in  faxior  of  foreign- 
ers.    This  it  does  by  allowing  free  competition  in  the 


6  Introd/iidory. 

products  of  their  industry,  and  taxing  foreign  products 
which  they  cannot  produce  or  compete  witli.  Two  tariff 
schedules  might  be  framed  for  a  country,  both  aiming  tO' 
raise  the  same  sum  for  revenue,  yet  the  one  might  be  a 
benefit  and  the  other  a  fearful  injury.  The  how  is  more 
important  than  the  how  much,  and  a  tariff  for'  revenue 
only  is  the  danger  and  calamity  to  he  avoided.  A  fcAV 
years  ago  Professor  Perry  gave  his  ''revenue  tarift' " 
scheme  as  follows  : 

■ "  I  would  throw  off  at  a  stroke  ninety  per  cent,  of  all  the  arti- 
cles taxed  in  our  present  tariff.  I  would  remit  the  duties  on  the- 
rest  to  that  point  at  which  the  most  revenue  would  come  in,  with 
the  least  interference  with  the  industries  of  the  people." 

By  duties  on  fifteen  or  tAventy  articles  he  proposed  to- 
raise  a  revenue  of  1150,000,000  yearly,  and  said  : 

"Why,  last  year  we  realized  on  tea  and  coffee,  sugar  and  mo* 
lasses,  wines  and  spirits,  tobacco  and  snuff — four  classified  arti- 
cles—$63, 595, 000. " 

To  impose  high  duties  on  such  articles  as  we  do  not 
and  cannot  produce  or  manufacture,  and  low  duties,  if 
any,  on  our  iron,  woolens,  cotton,  etc.,  is  his  scheme 
and  that  of  other  free  trade  revenue  reformers.  It  is, 
the  British  scheme,  and  it  is  a  fine  device  to  take  the  tax 
from  the  products  of  British  manufacturers  imported 
into  this  country  and  levy  it  on  the  comforts  and  neces- 
saries of  the  American  farmer  and  workingman.  It  is  a 
premium  or  discrimination  in  favor  of  foreign  manufac- 
turers and  foreign  pauper  wages,  and  against  our  own. 
manufacturers  and  farmers  and  better  paid  workmen. 
For  a  time  more  revenue  might  be  raised,  but  soon 
disaster  and  loss  of  revenue  would  follow.  Frame  the 
tariif  with  fit  duties  for  protection  and  revenue  on  such 
articles  as  we  can  make  or  produce,  and  admit  foreign 


The  Tariff  Question  Simple,  7 

products — tea,  coffee,  etc. — which  we  cannot  produce, 
free  of  duty,  and  the  sure  revenue  is  easily  raised  amidst 
permanent  prosperity.  Tlie  facts  of  our  history  verify 
this  statement. 

AD   VALOREM    DUTIES    NOT   BEST. 

Sometimes  such  duties  may  be  necessary,  l)ut  usually 
specific  rates  are  best — so  much  per  yard  or  pound,  etc. — 
or  most  honest  and  not  easily  evaded.  A  late  report  of 
Mr.  Martin,  a  special  treasury  agent,  says  : 

"  Since  the  passage  of  the  act  of  June  23,  1874,  commonly  called 
the  '  Anti-Moiety  Act,'  the  undervaluation  of  all  kinds  of  imported 
merchandise  has  steadily  increased  from  year  to  year  until  at  the 
present  time  its  proportions  are  enormous.  The  reports  from 
agents  sent  abroad  to  examine  into  the  subject  show  that  nearly 
all  classes  of  goods  paying  ad  valorem  duties  exported  from  vari- 
ous countries  to  the  United  States  are  undervalued.  More  partic- 
ularly is  this  the  case  with  goods  consigned  by  the  foreign  manu- 
facturers to  their  agents  in  this  country.  The  practice  of  con- 
signing goods  has  grown  to  such  proportions  that  there  has  been 
absolutely  no  foreign  market  value  for  many  articles  imported,  as 
there  are  no  sal&s  of  such  goods  in  the  open  market,  the  American 
merchants  being  compelled  to  purchase  from  the  agent  of  the  man- 
ufacturer to  whom  goods  are  consigned.  Investigation  has  shown 
that  upon  the  advice  of  the  agent  foreign  manufacturers  often 
invoice  consigned  goods  far  below  the  cost  of  production.  It  is 
estimated  that  less  tlian  40  per  cent,  of  the  60  per  cent,  ad  valorem 
duty  on  silk  is  collected  in  consequence  of  the  undervaluation  of 
that  article. 

Velvets,  plushes,  laces,  embroideries,  edgings  and  like  articles 
have  been  reported  as  systematically  undervalued  by  the  foreign 
manufacturers,  many  of  whom  openly  admit  that  they  invoice 
their  goods  to  this  country  at  lower  values  than  they  do  to  other 
coimtries." 

Iron  and  steel  are  undervalued  m  like  manner.  The 
loAv  rates  at  which  these  ffoods  are  invoiced  do  not  bene- 


8  Introductory. 

fit  the  American  customer,  for  the  consignee  advances 
his  price  to  their  real  value.  The  larger  part  of  the  im- 
porting in  New  York  is  done  through  these  agents, 
almost  always  foreigners.  An  Englishman  or  a  German 
will  rent  a  small  chamher  on  Broadway  and  sell  goods 
by  sample  ;  he  pays  no  taxes,  is  not  a  citizen,  has  no 
interest  for  us,  and  is  a  free  trader  of  course.  The  reg- 
ular importing  merchant,  who  would  do  a  more  honor- 
able business,  suffers  from  the  number  of  these  agencies. 

HOW    LONG    SHALL   PROTECTIVE    DUTIES    LAST  ? 

In  England  they  lasted  for  centuries,  and  a  strong 
feeling  is  growing  there  in  opposition  to  the  present  free 
trade  policy.  In  other  European  countries  such  duties 
exist  to-day.  Evidently  we  are  not  near  their  end  in 
this  new  country.  They  are  not  evils  to  be  put  aside,  or 
burthens  to  be  cast  off  as  soon  as  possible,  but  benefits 
to  be  maintained  so  long  as  necessary.  Suppose  all  wars 
ended  and  all  national  debts  paid  (and  this  happy  con- 
summation is  in  the  distance)  the  necessity  for  new  in- 
dustries, to  meet  the  gi-owing  and  complex  wants  of  a 
civilization  higher  than  we  can  imagine,  would  exist. 
Either  by  protective  duties,  or  by  some  system  inspired 
by  the  same  idea,  nations  would  still  encourage  their 
own  prodiicers. 

This  book  is  not  an  effort  either  to  mamtain  or  to 
change  existing  duties,  but  to  uphold  and  illustrate  the 
idea  of  protection  as  the  inspiring  soul  of  tariff  legisla- 
tion. 

The  aim  is  to  jiut  within  reach  of  all  a  manual  or  com- 
pendium of  an  American  uolicy  of  protection  to  home 
industry. 


CHAPTER  II. 

WHAT  IS  PROTECTION?— WHAT  IS  FREE  TRADE? 

Protection  to  home  industry  is  a  practical  fact ;  it  is 
the  policy  of  almost  every  civilized  nation,  and  is  as 
firmly  established  among  these  nations  to-day  as  ever. 
It  is  not  a  relic  of  barbarism,  but  an  inspiring  and  guid- 
ing element  in  our  highest  industrial  civilization. 

Free  trade  is  a  theory,  its  practice  unknown  in  any 
civilized  land.  Only  savages  are  absolutely  free  traders, 
and  they  have  no  trade. 

The  idea  of  protection  is  that  each  government  should 
encourage  the  industry  and  skill  of  its  people,  and  the 
development  of  the  natural  resources  of  its  territory,  and 
that,  to  this  end  customs-duties  on  foreign  imports 
should  be  so  levied  as  to  prevent  the  free  importation  of 
such  articles  as  can  be  made,  or  produced,  at  home,  and 
also  to  furnish  needed  government  revenue.  Duties 
thus  levied,  it  is  claimed,  so  encourage  and  protect 
home  manufactures,  and  home  labor  and  skill,  that 
those  manufactures  grow  solid,  the  workman  gets  varied 
•employ,  and  the  common  good  is  advanced. 

It  is  indeed  difficult  to  find,  in  any  country,  great 
industries  which  have  grown  up  under  free  trade. 

PROTHCTION   NOT  rKOHIBITION  OR  A  PANACEA. 

Instead  of  building  up  a  ''Chinese  wall,"  our  national 
experience  shows  that  a  large  and  healthy  foreign  trade 
— both  exports  and  inii)orts — grows  up  Avith  protective 
•duties,  which  help  to  solid  wealth  at  home  as  safe  basis 


10  What  is  Protection  ? 

for  domestic  and  foreign  commerce.  Our  tariff  regu- 
lates, but  does  not  prevent,  imports;  it  invigorates  and 
fructifies  our  home  domain  steadily  and  constantly, 
while  every  approach  to  free  trade  gives  us  tlie  deluge 
and  then  the  dearth. 

Protection  is  not  a  panacea,  good  against  crop  failures, 
bad  business  management  or  extravagance,  but  a  power- 
ful element  in  the  conservation  and  development  of 
national  resources  and  of  personal  skill  and  poAver. 
There  can  be  no  inflexible  standard  of  duties;  rates  good 
for  one  country  may  be  too  liigli  or  too  low  for  another, 
and  each  nation  must  consider  its  rates  of  interest,  and 
wages  and  revenue  needs,  and  so  sliape  its  tariff  as  to 
give  its  people  fair  scope  for  competition  with  others. 

Free  trade  is  absolutely  unrestricted  international 
intercourse;  free  exports  and  imports  without  custom 
houses.  It  does  not  exist  outside  of  savage  lands. 
Great  Britain,  its  professed  apostle  and  propagandist, 
has,  as  will  be  shown,  but  a  deceptive  and  fragmentary 
approach  to  this  theory.  It  has  been  styled  *'A  Science 
based  on  Assumptions,''  and  its  advocates  abound  in 
metaphysical  theories,  and  in  strange  notions  that  truth 
can  be  got  out  of  abstruse  assertions  unsustained  by 
facts.  Phiinly  enougli,  if  political  economy  is  to  be  of 
any  value,  we  want  the  liglit  of  facts  and  experience  as' 
a  guide  to  correct  ideas.  More  historic  truths  and  care- 
ful statements  touching  industry  and  trade — figures, 
dates,  causes  and  results — can  be  found  in  a  single  vol- 
ume of  Henry  C.  Carey  than  in  a  score  of  standard  free 
trade  books.  Rich  in  assei'tion  and  unsustained  theory, 
but  poor  in  facts,  must  be  the  verdict  as  to  free  trade 
writers. 

M.  Clievalier.  :ui  able  French  statesman,  well  said: 


What  is  Free  Trade  ?  11 

"Every  nation  owes  it  to  itself  to  seek  the  establishment  of 
diversification  in  the  pursuits  of  its  people.  *  *  *  It  is  not  an 
abuse  of  power,  but  the  douig  of  a  positive  duty  by  governments, 
so  to  act  at  each  epoch  in  the  progress  of  a  nation  as  to  favor- 
the  taking  possession  of  all  the  branches  of  industry  whose  acqui- 
sition is  authorized  in  the  nature  of  things." 

Such  "taking  possession,"  not  by  monopoly,  but  by 
fair  competition,  is  the  aim  of  a  protective  policy. 
John  Stuart  Mill  says  in  his  Political  Economy : 
"The  superiority  of  one  country  over  another  in  a  branch  of 
production  often  arises  from  having  begun  it  sooner.  There  may 
be  no  inherent  advantage  or  disadvantage  on  either  side,  but  only  a 
present  superiority  of  skill  and  experience.  A  country  which  has 
these  to  acquire  may.  in  other  respects,  be  better  adapted  to  the- 
production  than  those  earlier  in  the  field  ;  and  besides,  it  is  a  just 
remark,  that  nothing  has  a  greater  tendency  to  produce  improve- 
ment in  any  branch  of  production  than  its  trial  under  a  new  set  of ' 
conditions.  But  it  cannot  be  expected  that  individuals,  at  their- 
own  cost,  should  introduce  a  new  manufacture,  and  bear  the  bur- 
thens of  carrying  it  on  until  the  producers  have  been  educated  up. 
to  the  line  of  those  with  whom  the  processes  have  become  tradi- 
tional. A  PROTECTIVE  DUTY,  continued  for  a  reasonable  time, 
will  sometimes  be  the  least  inconvenient  mode  in  which  a  country 
can  tax  itself  for  the  support  of  such  an  experiment. 

This  grants  the  argument  to  protection,  as  a  principle,, 
and  comes  from  a  free  trade  writer  of  eminent  ability 
and  character. 

To  advocate  protection  for  any  industry — iron,  woolen,, 
wool,  etc.— while  advocating  free  trade  or  tariff  for  rev- 
enue only,  on  other  articles,  is  not  the  true  way.  The 
interdependence  of  all  industries,  and  such  fair  protec- 
tion as  each  and  all  may  need,  must  be  the  guide  and 
motive  of  honest  and  fair  action. 

Hon.  W.  H.  Calkins,  M.  C,  of  Indiana,  well  said. 

"  I  consider  it  to  be  my  duty  as  a  representative  of  the  people  to 
protect  the  labor  of  this  country.     I  do  not  care  what  the  product 


12  What  is  Protection  ? 

of  that  labor  may  be,  whether  it  be  pig-irou,  or  clothing,  or  sugar, 
or  anythiug  else.  I  want  to  protect  the  laborer  in  Louisiana  just 
as  far  and  as  much  as  I  want  to  protect  the  laborer  in  the  iron-mill 
of  Pennsylvania  or  Indiana,  and  no  further.  In  my  judgment 
that  is  all  there  is  in  this  question.  The  keystone  principle  upon 
which  this  country  rests  is  that  labor  is  noble.  Hence,  we  should 
put  it  in  the  power  of  the  laborer  to  get  the  highest  wages  obtain- 
able, not  only  for  his  own  benefit,  but  that  he  may  support  and 
educate  his  children  to  become  useful  members  of  society.  That 
is  the  idea  of  protection. " 

Protection  does  not  establish  monopoly,  but  breaks 
down  foreign  monopoly  by  encouraging  home  competi- 
tion. It  does  not  aim  to  benefit  one  class  at  the  cost  of 
another,  or  to  build  uj)  one  industry  at  the  exiaense  of 
another,  but  to  benefit  all  by  a  just  recognition  of  the 
interdependence  of  all  industries.  It  helj^s  domestic 
commerce  and  develops  our  own  resources,  and  so  gives 
solid  basis  for  a  healthy  foreign  commerce.  It  defends 
the  weak  against  the  strong,  cares  for  those  of  our  own 
household,  aims  to  advance  the  welfare  of  the  work- 
ing people  by  opening  varied  employments  at  fair 
wages,  and  elevates  the  character  of  our  national  life. 

The  American  Free  Trade  League  in  New  York 
defines  its  position  as  follows  : 

"We  believe  in  the  utmost  possible  freedom  for  all  citizens  of 
the  United  States  in  trade  as  well  as  in  other  relations  of  life  ;  but 
we  recognize  that  absolute  freedom  of  trade  must  be  limited  by 
the  revenue  necessities  of  the  government,  just  as  absolute  freedom 
in  other  respects  is  necessarily  limited  by  government;  and  therefore 
the  Free  Trade  League  willingly  submits  to  taxation  and  duties  to 
meet  the  government  necessities  ;  while  it  denounces  as  robberj' 
and  tyranny  all  taxation  for  the  benefit  of  special  classes. " 

This  is  free  trade  and  tariff  for  revenue  only,  which 
holds  protection  as  "robbery"  to  "benefit  special 
-classes." 


CHAPTER   III. 

VARIED  INDUSTRY  A   HELP  TO   BETTER  CIVILIZA- 
TION. 

To  look  at  the  policy  of  a  nation  only  as  it  may  affect 
wealth  in  money  and  other  material  things  is  a  partial 
and  fragmentary  view,  not  the  highest  and  therefore 
incomplete.  Such  wealth  is  important,  but  must  be 
gained  and  used  as  a  means  to  a  high  end — national  and 
personal  character.  The  old  way  of  winning  wealth  was 
by  warlike  robbery  ;  the  new  way  is  by  sui)remacy  in 
peaceful  industry. 

An  individual  will  aim  to  acquire  personal  independ- 
ence ;  equally  does  a  nation, — a  great  family  of  millions 
of  individuals,— want  national  independence.  The  indi- 
vidual, if  wise,  seeks  such  occupation  as  will  give  scope 
to  his  genius  and  ennoble  his  character  while  he  wins 
daily  bread  and  lays  by  some  savings.  The  nation  should 
so  shape  its  policy  as  to  give  scope  to  the  varied  genius 
of  its  people  and  help  them  to  a  higher  life,  Avhile  they 
win  its  wealth  by  their  toil  and  skill.  Governments 
personify  nations,  and  should  use  their  power  and  influ- 
ence for  the  best  good  of  all ;  especially  is  this  tlie  mis- 
sion and  duty  of  a  free  government,  whose  officials  are 
but  the  chosen  and  trusted  servants  of  the  people. 

The  wondrous  growtli  of  man  from  savage  to  civilized 
life  is  a  development  and  culture  of  varied  powers  of 
mind  and  body  to  meet  the  many  wants  and  finer  tastes 
of  the  more  perfect  being.  The  savage  has  a  narrow 
round  of  simple  occupations,  few  wants  easily  supplied, 

13 


14  What  is  Protection  ? 

thoughts  that  take  in  his  own  tribe  but  go  out  beyond 
in  dim  confusion.  Yet  in  that  lower  nature  are  the 
germs  of  a  higher,  a  divine  intent  ever  tends  to  lift  all 
upward,  and  at  last  come  the  larger  range  of  thought, 
the  more  complex  occupations,  tlie  many  wants,  the 
demand  for  beauty  and  order  and  perfectness,  which 
make  up  civilization  and  true  freedom.  The  industry  of 
the  savage  is  simple,  that  of  the  civilized  man  is  complex. 
The  lesson  of  history  is  that  varied  industry  is  a  product 
and  result  of  civilization,  and  that  those  governments 
which  have  done  most  to  encourage  it  have,  in  that  way, 
helped  to  lift  the  life  of  their  people  to  a  higher  level. 
When  government  encourages  the  genius  of  the  people 
it  has  the  strength  of  the  Eternal  Laws  on  its  side. 
Such  encouragement  is  the  idea  and  aim  of  protection  to 
home  industry. 

All  the  most  advanced  nations,  save  England,  have  a 
protective  policy. 

No  country  can  profit  so  much  by  diversified  industiy 
as  the  United  States,  for  no  other  country  has  such  varied 
advantages  and  natural  resources,  with  such  freedom  as 
quickens  the  ready  and  fluent  genius  of  the  people. 

The  protective  policy  of  Russia  has  helped  that  empire 
greatly.  Her  manufactures  increased  in  value  170  per 
cent,  from  1867  to  1879,  reaching  near  $400,000,000  and 
employing  750,000,000  workmen.  But  the  shadow  of 
Czarism — personal  and  irresponsible  despotism — chills  or 
corrupts  all.  Germany  has  made  great  progress  since 
the  adoption  of  her  Zollverein  ;  but  an  imperial  govern- 
ment with  an  immense  standing  army  liolds  a  toiling  and 
crowded  multitude  in  subjection.  Franco  has  gained 
better  results  for  her  people.  The  revolution  of  1789 
took  the  lands,  held  under  the  old  regime  by  church  and 


What  is  Free  Trade  ?  15 

state,  from  the  monk  and  the  noblemen  for  her  farmers 
to  hold  and  till,  and  this  gave  new  impetus  to  the  skill 
of  her  artisans,  which  the  government  has  wisely  encour- 
aged and  protected.  But  France  is  just  entering  on  an 
effort  for  pojiular  government,  and  has  emerged  but  yes- 
terday from  Napoleonic  and  Bourbon  rule  and  from  the 
waste  of  war.  All  these  are  jjrotective  nations,  and  such 
are  their  drawbacks. 

England  is  trying  a  new  experiment, — a  professed  free 
trade  policy.  Already  her  supremacy  is  slowly  waning. 
But  she  has  heavy  foreign  investments,  a  trade  over  every 
sea,  built  up  under  her  Navigation  Laws  (now  repealed) 
and  by  mail  contracts  and  greater  than  that  of  any  other 
nation,  immense  manufactures,  j3rofits  from  funds  abroad 
and  from  foreign  freights  and  exchanges  of  money 
estimated  at  from  $500,000,000  to  $650,000,000  yearly, 
and  manages  all  with  a  persistent  vigor  worthy  of  admir- 
ing resjaect,  differ  as  we  may  from  a  leading  feature  of  her 
policy.  Her  trouble  and  weakness  is  an  island  territory 
too  narrow  to  give  scope  for  the  best  diversified  industry. 
Her  pojiulation  must  be  too  largely  manufacturing,  and 
that  dwarfs  and  cramps  the  life  of  the  workmen.  Her 
farms  cannot  feed  her  factories;  she  cannot  be  self- 
dependent,  but  must  reach  out  with  unrelenting  grasp  for 
the  world's  trade,  and  for  raw  material  to  manufacture. 
Our  cotton  she  is  compelled  to  have.  If  it  fails  a  fatal 
calamity  smites  her.  We  are  under  no  such  dire 
necessity  of  selling  it,  for  we  can  work  it  up.  Yet  we 
send  far  the  largest  share  to  England  as  a  matter  of 
choice  and  profit.  Doubtless  we  shall  send  large  future 
supplies,  but  great  mills,  not  only  in  Lowell  but  in 
Southern  towns,  will  consume  more  at  home. 

The  "manifest  destiny"  of  this  country  is  not  to  be 


16  What  is  Protection  ? 

simply  a  great  agricultural  nation,  but  to  build  up  the- 
richest  and  most  benificent  varied  industry  and  com- 
merce in  the  world. 

We  cannot  have  the  best  farming  until  we  have  the 
best  manufacturing,  in  varied  forms  and  materials,  near 
the  farm,  each  an  indispensable  help  to  tlie  growth  and 
perfectness  of  the  other. 

Grive  us  both,  and  the  blending  of  these  varied 
experiences  and  vocations,  the  meeting  and  mingling  of 
these  many  life-currents,  tinged  and  shajjed  by  such 
wide  mastery  of  man  over  nature's  forces  and  materials, 
is  full  of  benefit.  It  is  civilization,  culture,  wealth  of 
soul  as  well  as  of  purse.  To  the  farmer  it  is  increase  of 
the  product  of  his  acres,  economy  of  exchange,  work  of 
hand  or  brain  for  whatever  gift  of  power  or  character 
his  children  may  possess,  instant  and  constant  call  for  a 
variety  of  labor,  and  all  the  while  the  thrill  of  inventive 
genius  pulsing  through  the  serene  quiet  of  his  life  in  the 
fields,  saving  it  from  all  narrowness  or  stagnation,  that 
he  may  the  more  enjoy  nature's  beauty  and  the  better 
make  her  forces  serve  him. 

We  have  exhaustless  coal  beds,  convertible  into 
exhaustless  power,  and  iron,  lead,  copper  and  the  pre- 
cious metals,  exhaustless  also.  We  have  a  broad  land  of 
varied  wealth,  cotton  and  wool  and  food.  With  these  gifts 
of  a  beneficent  Creator,  we  must  build  up  a  diversity  of 
occupations,  giving  complete  scope  to  all  powers  of  body 
and  brain,  ojDening  employ  to  all  and  helping  to  a  higher 
civilization. 

Thus  can  we  make  our  labor  more  productive  ;  elevate 
its  character  and  make  the  workman's  life  larger  and 
richer ;  save  the  waste  that  always  follows  crude  and 
unskilled  processes  ;  and  gain  that  mastery  over  nature's 


What  is  Free  Trade  f  17 

finer  forces  and  elements  which  is  symmetrj',  beauty, 
permanence,  strength  and  delicacy  in  every  product  of 
the  skilled  artisan,  with  his  genius  awakened  by  the  mul- 
tiform products  and  processes  growing  up  around  him. 

We  must  train  our  skill,  and  deyelop  our  artistic 
taste,  or  we  fall  behind  in  the  great  and  peaceful  strife 
of  national  industries.  To  be  dull  laggards  in  this 
noble  emulation  would  be  sore  disaster,  keeping  us  down 
to  poverty  of  life,  few  employments,  bankruptcy  and 
dependence.  Let  the  settled  policy  of  our  government 
be  to  jarotect  our  industry,  and  thus  develop  our  great 
resources  and  the  genius  of  our  people,  and  we  shall 
show  such  results  in  character  and  wealth  and  finest 
skill  as  the  world  has  never  seen.  Without  such  policy 
we  shall  grope  on  in  darkness  and  confusion,  the  giants 
trampling  the  pigmies  under  foot,  and  all  striking  at 
random  to  each  other's  harm. 

Under  the  old  conditions  in  the  South,  agriculture, — 
and  that  almost  wholly  of  one  kind,  in  the  cotton  field, 
— ^was  the  leading  and  exclusive  occupation.  That  fact 
was  a  blight  on  tlie  life  of  the  people,  and  the  fortunate 
hour  has  come  when  it  is  being  cured. 

In  NeAv  England  there  was  a  wide  range  of  industries, 
with  what  results  let  another  tell.  At  the  Fair  of  the 
New  England  Agricultural  Society,  in  Brattleboro,  Vt., 
in  1866,  Hon.  John  A.  Andrew,  Governor  of  Massa- 
chusetts, eloquently  said  : 

"I  desire  to  attract  the  observation  of  this  body  of  intelligent 
agriculturists  to  the  subject  of  the  diversification  of  industry,  in 
its  relation  to  the  prosperity  of  the  American  farmer.  I  can  do 
little  more  than  remind  you  that  vrhile  population  has  grown 
beyond  a  precedent,  wealth  has  advanced  beyond  population  ;  that 
in  proportion  as  our  industry  has  become  diversified,  our  capacity 
to  purchase  and  enjoy  the  fruits  of  the  earth  has  been  much  more 


18  What  is  Protection? 

than  correspondingly  enlarged  ;  and  tliat  the  union  of  the  people 
in  a  common  purpose  to  develop  all  their  powers,  by  whatever 
means,  whether  intellectual  or  mechanical,  is  the  secret  of  their 
own  growth,  and  the  amelioration  of  the  estate  of  man. 

"Better  fed,  with  more  fullness  and  variety;  better  clad,  in 
more  garments,  and  those  more  pleasing  to  the  sense  of  beauty;  bet- 
ter sheltered,  by  houses  more  commodious,  and  in  styles  of  more 
tasteful  architecture,  and  more  enduring  quality  ;  with  more  books 
and  newspapers,  and  larger  public  libraries;  enjoying  incomparably 
more  avenues  and  better  means  for  traveling,  and  for  transporta- 
tion of  goods  ;  with  ampler  crops  and  better  prices  than  ever 
before — this  very  Commonwealth  does,  in  its  own  current  history, 
afford  the  proof  of  the  advantages  of  our  American  aim  at  the 
largest  conquest  over  all  the  domains  of  industry." 

In  that  *' American  aim"  we  can  all  unite,  from 
Maine  to  the  Gulf,  to  the  G-olden  Gate  on  the  Pacific 
coast,  and  the  distant  forests  "where  rolls  the  Oregon.'* 

Let  the  reader  of  the  following  chapters,  while  study- 
ing facts  and  statistics  bearing  on  material  wealth,  find 
*'  between  the  lines "  that  a  protective  policy  fosters  a 
diversified  industry,  and  thus  helps  to  enlarge  and  lift  up 
the  life  of  the  people. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

PROTECTION  ABROAD— EUROPE  NOT  FREE  TRADE. 

It  is  supposed  by  many  that  the  protective  policy  is 
contrary  to  the  practice  of  the  great  European  nations, 
and  that  the  best  European  thought  is  opposed  to  it. 
It  is  the  fashion  in  many  of  our  colleges  to  assume  that 
free  trade  is  the  ideal  of  the  noblest  persons  and  the 
best  minds  in  the  Old  World,  while  protection  is  a  vulgar 
and  selfish  matter  advocated  by  those  of  lesser  note  and 
narrower  culture.  Professor  Perry  asserts  that ''  to  relax 
commercial  systems  and  not  to  restrict  them  is  alone 
in  accord  with  the  spirit  of  the  age  and  the  leading 
commercial  nations,  the  United  States  alone  excepted, 
have  been  relaxing  their  commercial  systems."  This 
assertion  has  little  if  any  proof  outside  of  England.  The 
British  Chamber  of  Commerce  declared  in  1865  that, 
"  in  Russia  the  importation  of  foreign  articles  is  practi- 
cally prevented  by  a  scale  of  duties  higher  than  any  in 
the  world."  Some  changes  were  made  in  1869,  but  this 
same  chamber  says  they  "would  not  lead  to  any  exten- 
sion of  legitimate  trade."  Austrian  duties  range  from 
24  to  67  per  cent.  Henry  C.  Carey  said  the  great  pro- 
gress of  Germany  from  poverty  to  wealth  in  the  past 
thirty-five  years  "is  owing  to  the  great  and  simple 
operations  of  the  Zollverein,  (Customs  Union),  which 
is  among  the  most  important  measures  ever  adopted  in 
Europe."  Frederick  List,  whose  leading  idea  was  to 
build  up  German  industries  by  protection,  had  leading 
part  in  shaping  that  measure  and   said,  in  1861,  that 

19 


20  Protection  Ahroad. 

"  it  affords  jDrotection  from  20  to  60  per  cent,  on  manu- 
factures," and  had  "  wrought  a  wonderful  and  excellent 
change."  List  was  a  student  of  Carey's  great  worksy 
which  are  translated  in  German  and  Italian,  and  greatly 
prized  by  able  Europeans.  Australia  and  Canada, 
colonies  of  free  trade  England,  have  protective  tariffs. 

Sir  Edward  Sullivan,  an  eminent  English  writer  op- 
posed to  their  free  trade  system,  says  : 

"Protection  is  as  firmly  drawn  around  all  the  native  industries 
of  Europe  and  America  as  it  was  twenty  years  ago,  and  genera- 
tions will  elapse  before  there  is  any  sensible  move  in  the  opposite 
direction.  If  the  English  operative  class  are  to  wait  till  universal 
free  trade  overspreads  the  world,  England  must  be  turned  into  a 
Sleepy  Hollow,  to  be  awakened  every  hundred  years,  to  see  how 
foreigners  are  learning  their  duty  to  their  neighbors  as  well  as  to 
themselves. 

' '  We  are  told  free  trade  principles  are  spreading  ;  why,  in  Prus- 
sia, Austria,  Belgium,  Switzerland,  the  idea  even  of  opening  their 
ports  and  markets,  and  inviting  competition  with  their  own  indiJS- 
trial  population,  has  never  yet  been  mooted. 

"France,  Belgium,  Switzerland,  and  Prussia  have  increased 
materially  in  wealth  and  prosperity  during  the  last  twenty  years; 
capital  has  flowed  steadily  and  with  increasing  rapidity  into  them; 
new  manufactures  have  sprung  up;  existing  industries  have 
increased;  trade  has  flourished;  speculation  and  enterprise  have 
taken  the  place  of  apathy  and  want  of  confidence.  All  this  has- 
taken  place  under  a  system  of  protection. " 

The  Anglo-French  Commercial  treaty  is  sometimes 
called  a  free  trade  measure,  but  the  Bradford  Cliamber 
of  Commerce  (English)  complains  that  the  French  tariff 
is  "  unreasonable  "  and  '^  excessive." 

Sweden  has  its  protective  policy,  as  has  every  other 
European  nation  of  any  consequence. 

The  question  of  an  inquiry  into  the  operation  of  the 
commercial  treaties  being  before  the  Corps  Legislatif, 


Europe  not  Free  Trade.  21 

M.  Louis  Adolphe  Thiers,  afterward  President  of  the 
French  Eepublic,  on  the  22d  of  January,  1870,  ad- 
dressed it  as  follows  : 

"Every  nation  has  three  great  affairs,  which  should  be  the 
object  of  its  ardent  and  constant  solicitude  :  liberty  first,  its  great- 
ness next,  and  finally  its  material  prosperity.  Liberty,  which 
consists  not  merely  in  the  right  of  the  nation  to  criticise  its  gov- 
ernment, but  in  the  right  of  governing  itself  by  its  own  hands, 
and  conformably  to  its  own  ideas ;  greatness,  which  does  not  con- 
sist in  subjecting  its  neighbors  by  brute  force,  but  in  exercising 
over  them  so  much  influence  that  no  question  shall  be  resolved  in 
the  world  against  its  interests  and  security;  prosperity,  finally, 
which  consists  in  drawing  from  its  own  soil,  and  from  the  genius 
of  its  inliabitants,  the  greatest  possible  amount  of  well-being. 

"And  do  not  think  that  this  anxiety  for  the  prosperity  of  the 
country  has  anything  in  common  with  that  passion  for  material 
interests  which  the  highest  minds  despise.  There  is  no  work  of 
higher  morality  than  to  diminish  the  sum  of  the  evils  which 
weigh  upon  man,  even  in  the  most  civilized  societies.  To  make 
man  less  unhappy, — that  is,  to  make  him  better, — it  is  to  make 
him  more  just  towards  his  government,  to  his  fellow-beings,  to- 
wards Providence  itself. 

"  We  are  told  that  we  would  have  a  hot-house  industry.  What, 
then,  are  the  nations  which  have  sought  to  develop  among  them- 
selves a  national  labor?  They  are  the  nations  which  are  intelli- 
gent and  free.  When  the  foreigner  brings  them  a  product,  after 
they  have  found  it  serviceable,  they  desire  to  imitate  it.  The  na- 
tions which  do  not  have  this  desire  are  the  indolent  nations  of  the 
East;  intelligent  and  free  nations  seek  to  appropriate  for  them- 
selves the  products  brought  to  them  by  foreign  nations. 

' '  It  is  urged  that  all  the  protections  accorded  to  industry  con- 
stitute monopolies,  and  that,  to  enrich  a  few  monopolists,  we  bur- 
den the  whole  country.  It  is  true  there  is  a  monopolj^;  but  it  is 
not  in  France,  it  is  abroad.  I  desire  to  say  that  this  little 
monopoly,  which  you  accord  to  French  industry,  destroys  the 
monopoly  of  foreign  industry. 

"When  the  linen  industry  was  destroyed  in  France  by  the 
English  production  by  power,  a  kilogram  of  thread  was  worth 


22  Protection  Ahroad. 

seven  francs.  We  pi'otected  the  linen  industry  in  France.  This 
protection  permitted  competition;  and  the  French  product  com- 
pelled the  English  manufacturers  to  lower  their  prices  to  three 
francs  fifty  centimes. 

"  If  England  were  the  only  country  to  produce  certain  objects, 
could  you  have  them  at  the  same  price?  Certainly  not.  It  is 
competition,  sustained  by  a  just  protection,  which  destroys  for- 
eign monopoly. 

"  Cotton  is  the  grand  textile  of  modern  times.  What  is  the  im- 
portance of  the  industry  of  cotton  among  us  ?  We  work  up  600,- 
000  or  700,000  bales,  which  represent  in  value  300,000,000  francs. 
When  the  cotton  has  been  spun,  woven,  converted  into  plain 
cloths,  printed  cloths,  haberdashery,  hosiery,  its  value  is  forty 
times  that  sum.  No  industry  has  superior  or  equal  importance. 
It  is  exposed  to  a  double  rivalry,  that  of  the  English  and  of  the 
Swiss. 

"  The  English  have  over  us  immense  advantages  :  great  capital, 
raw  material,  an  enormous  commerce,  machines  in  the  greatest 
number,  coal  at  the  cheapest  price,  and  finally,  which  is  a  capital 
point,  have  the  cheapness  which  results  from  an  immense  produc- 
tion. Whilst  we  move  6,000,000  of  spindles,  they  move  34,000,- 
000;  we  work  up  600,000  bales  of  cotton,  they  work  up  3,000,000. 

"A  kilogram  of  cotton  yarn  was  worth  twenty-seven  francs  in 
our  war  days;  after  peace  it  was  as  high  as  fourteen  francs.  We 
created  a  competition  with  England  and  it  fell  to  three  francs. 
Every  time  you  protect  a  national  product  you  cause  the  price  of 
the  domestic  product  to  fall,  and  you  prevent  monopoly." 

Turkey,  ill-governed  and  ignorant,  did  not  adopt  a 
protective  policy.  Formerly  she  produced  wool,  silk, 
corn,  and  cotton,  in  large  quantities ;  coal,  iron  and 
copper  abound.  Two  hundred  years  ago  her  trade  with 
Europe  was  large,  and  her  merchants  rich.  But,  in  an 
evil  hour,  the  government  made  a  treaty  with  England 
and  France,  agreeing  to  charge  no  more  than  three  ])er 
cent,  duty  on  their  imports,  and  to  exempt  their  vessels 
from  port  charges.     Great  Britain  forbade  the  exporta- 


Europe  not  Free  Trade.  23 

tion  of  her  machinery  to  Turkey,  as  well  as  of  her 
mechanics,  mIio  might  have  gone  there  to  make  it. 

Of  course,  Turkish  manufactures  were  ruined. 

In  Scutari,  there  were  six  hundred  looms  in  1812 ; 
but  forty  remained  in  1831 ;  and  of  two  thousand  weav- 
ing shops  in  Tournova  in  1812,  but  two  hundred  were 
left  in  1830.  As  in  most  purely  agricultural  countries, 
the  cultivators  are  in  debt.  Twenty  years  ago  the  total 
exports  of  Turkey  were  but  $33,000,000,  while  those  of 
England  to  that  country  were  but  111,000,000  yearly. 
Egj^t,  under  the  relentless  grasp  of  British  policy,  is 
compelled  to  free  trade,  and  is  poor  as  well  as  powerless. 

This  summary  of  the  protective  policy  of  leading 
nations  on  the  European  continent  refutes  all  contrary 
assertions. 


CHAPTER  V. 

BRITISH  FREE  TRADE  A  DELUSION. 

Forty  years  ago  England  adopted  what  she  calls  free 
trade,  but  what  is  really  an  inconsistent  and  deceptive 
approach  toward  a  theory  which  no  civilized  nation  ever 
carried  out  in  practice.  For  centuries  she  was  rigidly 
protective,  and  then  modified  her  course  ;  acting  in  both 
cases  for  what  was  held  as  her  own  best  interest. 

Brief  paragraphs  from  an  excellent  address  by  H.  H. 
Adams,  of  Cleveland,  (Report  of  the  Tariff  Convention 
at  Chicago,  November,  1881,)  will  give  glimpses  of  the 
rigidity  of  English  protection  and  prohibition  in  past 
days  : 

"  We  find  as  far  back  in  her  history  as  870  she  enacted  laws 
regulating  the  importation  of  goods  manufactured  on  the  conti- 
nent by  the  Germans,  and  '  dues '  were  paid  on  goods.  Even 
then  they  '  were  not  to  forestall  the  market  to  the  prejudice  of 
the  citizens.' 

"  In  or  about  1431,  the  laws  prohibiting  the  importation  of  goods, 
except  in  English  ships,  were  enacted.  In  1504  an  act  of  Parlia- 
ment was  made  to  regulate  or  restrict  the  importations  of  foreign- 
made  silk  (19  Henry,  VII.,  c  21),  prohibiting  'all  persons  for  the 
future  from  bringing  into  the  realm  to  be  sold  any  manner  of  silk 
wrought  by  itself,  or  with  any  other  stuff  in  any  place  out  of  this 
realm.' 

"In  1567  a  law  was  enacted  that  for  the  exportation  of  sheep 
the  offender  '  should  forfeit  all  his  effects,  suffer  impHsontnenl  for 
a  year,  and  then  ham  his  left  hand  cut  off  in  a  market  tmcn,  and  on 
a  market  day,  tobe  there  nailed  up  ;  and  for  the  second  offense  shoxM 
mffer  death.' 

24 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  25 

"  Some  of  the  enactments  of  parliament  for  the  years  1559  to 
1603  were  as  follows  : 

The  exportation  of  wool  prohibited. 

The  coasting  trade  restricted  to  English  vessels. 

The  importation  of  minerals,  linished  leather,  etc.,  prohibited. 

The  immigration  of  skilled  labor — smiths,  miners,  etc. — was 
encouraged,  and  duties  laid  on  imported  cloths 

"In  1700  the  importation  of  calicos,  chintzes  and  muslins  pro- 
hibited 

"In  1720,  any  person  found  wearing  a  printed  calico  dress  was 
fined  five  pounds,  and  the  seller  fined  twenty  pounds.  The  export- 
.ation  of  machinery  for  working  flax  was  not  repealed  until  Eng- 
land opened  her  ports  to  free  trade  in  1842. 

"In  1646,  after  noting  in  preamble  the  benefits  arising  from  cus 
toms,  received  on  imports,  from  the  plantations  in  Virginia  and 
other  places  in  America,  Parliament  inaugurated  restrictive  meas- 
ures on  goods  exported  from  her  colonies.  '  None,  in  any  of  the 
ports  of  the  said  plantations,  do  suffer  any  ship  or  vessel  to  load  any 
goods,  of  the  growth  of  the  plantations,  and  carry  them  to  foreign 
ports,  except  in  English  bottoms." 

"We  have  to  thank  our  good  mother  for  her  jealous  care  over  us 
displayed  by  the  act  of  Parliament  (in  1731)  prohibiting,  under 
forfeiture  of  ship  and  cargo,  carrying  into  any  part  of  her  Ameri- 
can colonies,  sugar,  rum  or  molasses  gi'own  in  the  plantations  of 
any  foreign  power. " 

In  Oliver  Cromwell's  day  that  great  man  saw  Holland 
gaining  a  large  share  of  the  ocean  carrying  trade  of  the 
world,  her  ships  on  every  sea  and  her  war  vessels  numer- 
ous and  powerful.  He  felt  that  England  must  win  this 
supremacy  in  peace  and  in  war,  and  that  a  great  com- 
mercial marine  was  the  nursery  of  a  powerful  war  navy. 
Under  his  inspiring  guidance  rigid  navigation  laws — 
forbidding  the  importation  of  foreign  products  save  in 
English  vessels,  or  in  those  of  the  country  from  whence 
those  products  came — were  passed.  This  and  other 
measures  to  encourage  ship  building  crippled  the  carrying 


26  British  Free  Trade  a  DeVusimi. 

trade  of  Holland  and  built  up  a  great  English  commer- 
cial marine  and  war  navy.  Tliis  policy  was  kept  up 
so  long  as  it  seemed  necessary  and  then  came  a  change. 
Free  ships  were  glorified,  and  navigation  laws  put  aside, 
because  England  thought  her  fleets  could  sweep  every 
sea  fearless  of  competition,  and  be  the  carriers  of  every 
land. 

Notwithstanding  the  free  ship  cry,  the  British  govern- 
ment pays  about  14,000,000  yearly  to  her  ocean  steamers 
for  foreign  postal  service. 

Vast  accumulations  of  wealth,  and  improvements  in 
mechanism  and  manufacturing  processes  with  consequent 
low  j)rices,  had  taken  place  in  these  centuries  of  protec- 
tion, and  a  time  came  when  the  praises  of  free  trade 
were  sounded  through  the  land  and  lieard  around  the 
world.  No  doubt  some  of  its  advocates  were  wholly 
earnest  and  sincere  in  their  ideas  of  its  philanthropic 
benefits,  and  wished  it  carried  out  in  good  faith  and 
honest  consistency;  but  their  ideals  were  not  attained, 
and  from  the  start  inconsistency  and  grasping  self- 
interest  bore  large  sway. 

MONOPOLY    OF   ALL   MARKETS. 

In  the  House  of  Lords,  in  one  of  the  early  debates  on 
the  question.  Lord  Goderich  said: 

"  Other  nations  knew,  as  well  as  the  noble  lord  opposite,  and 
those  who  acted  with  him,  that  loliat  tee  (the  English)  ineaiit  by 
free  trade,  was  notJdng  more  nor  less  than,  by  means  of  the  great  ad- 
vantages we  enjoyed,  to  get  the  monopoly  of  all  their  markets  for  our 
manufactures,  and  to  prevent  tliem,  one  and  all,  from  ever  becoming 
manufacturing  nations. 

"The  policy  that  France  acted  on  was  that  of  encouraging  its 
native  manufactures,  and  it  was  a  wise  policy;  because,  if  it  were 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  27 

freely  to  admit  our  manufactures,  it  would  speedily  be  reduced  to 
aa  agricultural  nation,  and  therefore  a  poor  nation,  as  all  must  be 
that  depend  exclusively  on  agriculture. " 

So  we  leurn  from,  this  precious  revelation,  that 
**  British  free  trade "  really  means  the  monopoly  of  all 
markets,  and  the  breaking  down  of  all  manufactures 
except  their  own.  This  English  nobleman  has  at  least 
the  merit  of  frankness  ;  but  philanthropy  is  not  appar- 
ent. 

UNDERSELL,  YET   SEEM   MAGN'ANIMOUS. 

Only  in  1840  commenced  any  change  of  note  in 
British  ix»licy.  A  committee  was  then  chosen,  with 
Joseph  Hume  as  chairman,  ''  to  inquire  into  the  several 
duties  levied  on  imports."  What  his  aim  would  be  may 
be  judged  from  his  'nash,  exj^ressed  in  Parliament 
years  before,  that  "the  manufactures  of  the  Continent 
might  be  strangled  in  their  cradle."  This  committee's 
report  said,  that  ''  the  tariff  presents  neither  congruity 
nor  unity  of  purpose ;  no  general  principles  seem  to 
have  been  applied." 

In  1842  the  famed  tariff  of  Sir  Robert  Peel  was 
enacted.  Was  it  free  trade  ?  Let  Mr.  Gladstone,  Chan- 
cellor of  the  English  Exchequer,  answer  :  "  It  was  an 
attempt  to  make  a  general  approach  to  the  following 
rules :  First,  the  removal  of  prohibitions ;  secondly, 
the  reduction  of  duties  on  manufactured  articles  and 
protective  duties  generally,  to  an  average  of  twenty  per 
cent,  ad  valorem;  tldrdly,  on  partially  manufactured 
articles  to  rates  not  exceeding  ten  per  cent. ;  fourtJily, 
on  raw  materials  to  rates  not  over  five  per  cent." 

Simply  a  reducing  to  order  of  a  chaos  of  centuries  of 
patchwork  acts,  a  reduction  of  some  duties  in  view  of" 


28  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

the  well  known  fact,  that,  with  such  reduction,  their 
Well  established  manufacturers  would  still  undersell  the 
world,  and  yet  seem  magnanimous,  and  low  duties  on 
food  and  raw  materials,  and  articles  partly  manufac- 
tured, Avhicli,  of  course,  would  help  home  manufactures. 

But  Peel  himself  said,  in  his  speech  closing  the  debate 
on  the  bill :  "I  do  not  abolish  all  protective  duties  ;  on 
the  contrary,  the  amended  tariff  maintains  many  duties 
that  are  purely  protective,  as  distinguished  from  revenue 
duties. " 

The  tariffs  of  1845  and  1846  were  similar  in  their 
general  tenor,  but  of  less  consequence ;  carefully  pro- 
tective, loliere  necessary,  reduced  where  no  home  interest 
was  hurt  thereby,  reduced  indeed  sometimes  to  benefit 
home  interests,  by  giving  raw  material  cheaper  to  the 
manufacturer. 

In  1849  came,  after  warm  and  long  debate,  the  virtual 
repeal  of  the  corn  laws,  placing  the  duty  on  grain  at  a 
shilling  ii  ((uarter,  which  was  abolished  in  1869. 

It  must  1)6  borne  in  mind  that  corn,  in  English  com- 
mercial lani^Tiage,  includes  grain  oi  all  kinds,  and  that 
wheat  was  the  grain  most  largely  imjDorted,  so  that 
the  repeal  of  the  duty  on  corn  gave  wheat,  which 
was  especially  wanted  for  food  for  the  people,  free 
entrance  to  the  ports  of  Great  Britain.  This  repeal 
took  place  at  the  time  when  it  was  manifest  that 
England  could  not  feed  her  own  people,  and  the  free 
admission  of  foreign  grains,  and  other  farm  products, 
would  give  them  cheaper  food.  It  was  a  necessity  to 
reduce  the  price  of  breadstuffs  at  home,  to  stop  English 
manufacturers  from  emigi'ating  to  the  European  Conti- 
nent and  starting  their  business  abroad  where  food  was 
cheaper.     The  repeal  of  the  corn  laws  was  an  important 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  29 

step  in  the  interest  of  British  mannfaeturers,  while  the 
fact  that  a  benefit  to  the  working  classes  (which  has  not 
been  realized)  was  confidently  expected  from  it,  enlisted 
a  powerful  and  genuine  philanthropic  feeling  in  its  favor, 
and  cast  a  decei^tive  glamour  of  philanthropy  around 
the  whole  free  trade  movement. 

In  1874  the  sugar  duties  were  abolished,  greatly  to  the 
injury,  it  was  said,  of  the  sugar  refiners.  It  is  now 
claimed  that  these  were  the  last  protection  duties,  and 
that  Great  Britain  has  "  a  free  trade  tariff,  with  duties 
for  revenue  only."  The  duty  on  corn  was  repealed 
because  it  was  expected  England  could  thus  huy  cheaper 
food  ;  the  duties  on  manufactured  goods  were  repealed 
because  England  expected  to  sell  cheaper  than  any  other 
country. 

THIS  "  FEEE  TEADE  TARIFF "  A  FALSE  CLAIM. 

Plain  facts  will  show  the  falsehood  of  that  claim. 
Let  us  see  it,  however,  as  made  by  Mongredien,  an 
English  writer  selected,  not  for  his  special  ability  but 
because  the  Cobden  Club  endorse  him.  In  a  small 
book  published  in  New  York,  "  History  of  the  Free 
Trade  Movement  in  England,"  he  asks  (see  page  172)  : 

"  Is  our  present  tariff  one  from  which  every  shred  and 
vestige  of  protection  have  been  discarded  ?  Is  it  truly 
and  thoroughly  a  free  trade  tariff  ?  That  these  ques- 
tions must  be  answered  in  the  affirmative  it  is  easy  to 
prove  in  the  most  conclusive  manner,"  He  then  says 
that  their  revenue  of  1100,000,000  from  customs  duties 
is  adduced  by  protectionists  to  show  that  they  are  not 
really  free  trade  ;  declares  "■'  That  such  an  inference  is 
totally  erroneous  will  presently  be  made  manifest  beyond 
all  question  ;"  and  makes  it  manifest  as  follows  :     "  We 


80  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

BOW  levy  import  duties  on  only  fifteen  articles.  Sub- 
joined is  a  list  of  them,  and  to  each  is  appended  the 
amount  of  duty  levied  on  it  during  the  financial  year 
1879.  (The  amounts  are  given  in  dollars  for  conven- 
ience). 

AETICLES   IMPORTED,  NOT  PRODUCED   IK   ENGLAND. 

Tobacco $42,949,405 

Tea 20, 846, 165 

Coffee 1,060,010 

Chicoiy 833,995 

Chocolate  aud  cocoa 223,355 

Dried  fruit 2,546,170 

Wine 7,348,550 

$75,307,650 
Imported  articles  produced  in  England  : — 
Spirits,  gold  and  silver  plate,  beer  vine- 
gar, playing  cards,  pickles,  malt,  spruce,     $26,734,720 

Total  duties $102,042,870 

*'  It  will  be  seen  that  three-fourths  of  the  total  sum  is 
levied  on  articles  which  we  do  not  and  cannot  produce. 
It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  this  portion  cannot  by  any 
possibility  be  said  to  afford  the  slightest  protection  to 
native  industry."  He  then  says  that  the  duty  on 
imported  spirits,  of  over  $25,000,000,  is  a  countervailing 
duty  to  balance  the  excise,  or  internal  revenue  tax.  By 
the  above  statement  he  makes  the  free  trade  tariff  case 
"  manifest  beyond  all  question."  The  slight  difficulty 
in  his  statement  is,  it  is  not  true.  Instead  of  "  only 
fifteen  articles,"  there  are  fifty-three  articles  on  their 
official  list  on  which  duties  are  levied.  (Hon.  W.  D. 
Kelley,  M.  C. ,  in  Congressional  debate. )  He  puts  tobacco, 
coffee,  chocolate  and  cocoa  in  three  lines,  craftily  leaving 
his  readers  to  infer  that  a  uniform  duty  is  levied  on  these 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  31 

articles,  quite  contrary  to  the  fad.  On  unmanufactured 
tobacco  the  duty  is  75  cents  per  ponnd,  or  84  cents  if 
of  less  than  ten  per  cent,  moisture.  On  manufactured 
tobacco  the  duty  is  96  cents  and  110  cents  for  tAvo  kinds, 
and  on  snuff  and  cigars  from  100  cents  to  130  cents  per 
pound. 

On  raw  coffee  the  duty  is  fourteen  sliillings  per  hun- 
dred pounds ;  if  roast  or  ground,  seventeen  shillings. 
Cocoa  husks  and  shells  pay  half  a  cent  a  pound,  if  manu- 
factured four  cents.  Observe,  in  each  item  a  care- 
fid  discrimination,  and  less  duties  on  the  raw  material. 
This  is  protection  to  the  British  manufacturer.  It  is 
not  a  duty  according  to  the  value.  The  finest  leaf 
tobacco  pays  less  than  the  poorest  manufactured  worth 
less  per  pound.  The  choicest  Mocha  or  Java  coffee,  if 
raw,  pays  less  than  the  poorest  ground  or  roasted  article 
of  less  value.  It  is  a  protection  to  home  manufactures. 
Tobacco  is  the  most  important,  and  of  this  the  United 
States  sends  them  the  largest  part  of  their  consumption. 
The  duty  on  leaf  tobacco  is  twenty  cents  less  than  on  the 
lowest  grade  manufactured,  and  fifty  cents  less  than  on 
higher  grades.  Our  exports  of  leaf  tobacco  to  Great 
Britain  in  1880  were  33,996,486  pounds  ;  average  valua- 
tion lOy^Q-  cents  per  pound ;  duty  at  least  75  cents  or 
$25,497,364,  at  the  modest  rate  of  seven  hundred  per 
cent,  or  more.  Of  manufactured  tobacco  we  sent  them, 
the  same  year,  less  than  one-fifth  in  value  compared  to 
the  leaf  (8720,554  to  $3,693  799)  and  not  one-tenth  as 
much  in  weight  jirobably. 

That  pretended  '^free  trade  tariff,''^  on  over  forty  per 
cent,  of  the  total  dutiable  imports  of  Great  Britain,  so 
discriminates  betiveen  manufactured  and  raio  materials, 
by  duties  from  twenty-five  to  forty-five  per  cent,  higher 


32  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

on  tJie  first  than  on  the  last,  as  to  give  effective  protection 
to  her  own  mannfactures.  Meanwhile  Mr.  Mongredieu 
and  liis  like  assert  that  "  every  shred  or  vestige  of  pro- 
tection has  been  discarded  from  it !"  Plate  gold  has  a 
duty  of  l-t.OS  per  ounce,  and  plate  silver  36  cents  per 
ounce ;  the  bullion,  or  raw  material  being  free.  This 
"  shred  "  the  Cobden  club  man  conveniently  ignores. 

This  pretense  of  free  trade  appears  all  the  more  absurd 
when  we  see  that  the  British  government  levies  duties 
on  the  goods  of  other  countries — tea,  coffee,  the  tobacco 
of  the  United  States,  etc. — when  brought  into  their 
ports,  but  asks  that  those  countries  shall  levy  no  duties 
on  her  goods.  Is  this  the  boasted  freedom  of  commer- 
cial intercourse  ? 

John  McGregor,  one  of  the  joint  secretaries  of  the 
British  Board  of  Trade,  after  a  laborious  and  searching 
inquiry  into  the  industrial  affairs  of  almost  every  Euro- 
pean country,  came  to  the  conclusion  : 

"That  England,  with  all  her  natural  advantages  of  position, 
wtdch  110  otlier  country  possesses  in  the  same  degree,  and  the  intelli- 
gence and  industry  of  her  artisans,  togetlier  with  capital,  machin- 
ery, and  other  elements,  such  as  coal  and  iron,  and  the  superiority 
of  her  liarbors  for  exportation,  and  many  other  internal  advan- 
tages as  to  carriage  and  intercourse,  should  have  nothing  but  fiscal 
taxation — that  is,  duties  for  revenue  only  ;  have  no  protection,  at  all, 
but  only  equalize  upon  equitable  principles  the  system  of  taxing 
the  population  for  revenue  ;  and  they  may  then  meet  tlie  people  of 
all  other  nations  with  their  mannfactures,  in  every  country  in  tlie 
world,  and  in  most  articles  undersell  them." 

An  emphatic  suggestion  of  Mr.  McGregor's  gives  the 
key  to  the  English  policy — professed  "  duties  for  revenue 
only  *  *  no  protection  at  all."  The  cry  in  this 
country  for  a  "  tariff  for  revenue  only "  is  the  echo  of 
this  British  voicu. 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  33 

While  it  is  important  to  sliow  the  character  and  results 
of  English  legislation  on  tliis  subject,  and  the  motives 
for  their  active  interest  in  our  affairs,  we  must  bear  in 
mind  that  even  if  free  trade  works  well  there,  that  is 
no  reason  why  we  should  adopt  it.  Tlie  policy  of  each 
country  must  be  shaped  by  its  own  condition.  Yet  if, 
in  a  country  the  best  prepared  for  free  trade  of  any  in 
the  world,  that  policy  works  badly,  its  poor  results  surely 
add  weight  against  our  adopting  it. 

REACTIOIf   AGAIISrST   FREE   TRADE    IN   E^STGLAND. 

While  free  trade  is  the  policy  of  the  English  majority 
there  is  not  the  unanimity  in  its  favor,  either  among 
the  working  classes  or  the  leaders  in  thought,  tliat 
we  are  led  to  suppose.  A  strong  reaction  against  it 
has  sprung  up  of  late,  its  opponents  asking  for  "fair 
trade"  and  "reciprocity"  but  really  accepting  the  pro- 
tective idea.  An  able  work  by  Sir  Edward  Sullivan, 
"  Protection  to  Native  Industry,"  has  passed  through 
several  editions  in  that  country  and  lias  been  repub- 
lished here.  Some  extracts  will  show  the  method  and 
weight  of  his  arguments.  He  says  tlie  movement  started 
among  the  workingmen,  and  then  goes  on  as  follows  : 

"Is  it  not  absurd,  and  stupid,  and  irritating  to  the  worlving 
classes  to  admit  duty  free  all  they  produce,  to  tax  all  they  con- 
sume ;  to  admit  duty  free  clocks,  watches,  silk,  paper,  gloves, 
glass,  ribbons,  hats,  boots,  shoes,  millinery,  the  finer  kind  of  cot- 
ton goods,  and  linen,  and  scores  of  other  industries  and  to  con- 
tinue a  heavy  tax  on  cocoa,  cofEee,  sugar,  tea  and  tobacco  ? 

"The  operative  class  are  the  largest  consumers  of  cocoa,  tea, 
coffee,  sugar  and  tobacco  ;  and  they  are  the  actual  producers  of 
all  the  articles  of  foreign  manufacture  that  are  admitted  duty  free 
into  our  markets. 

"The  present  state  of  affairs  hits  them  doubly  hard,  they  suffer 
both  ways  ;  the  value  of  their  wages  is  diminished  by  the  amount 


34  British  Jfree  Trade  a  Delusion. 

of  the  customs  duty  charged  on  the  necessary  articles  of  food  they 
consume  ;  and  the  amount  of  their  wages  is  reduced  by  the  free 
admission  of  foreign  articles'  of  manufacture  to  compete  with 
those  they  produce. 

' '  At  present  emigration  is  confined  to  the  operative  class  ;  but 
there  is  another  emigration  that  is  threatened  that  will  be  far  more 
ruinous  in  its  effects,  viz. :  an  emigi'ation  of  capital  and  manufac- 
tiu-ers  ;  what  can  the  British  operative  do  if  his  employer  and  capi- 
tal disappear  together?       ****** 

"There  cannot  exist  the  least  doubt  that  our  manufacturing- 
position  is  on  the  wane." 
********* 

(Complaints  also  come  from  England  of  distress  in  the 
agrieultnral  interests.) 

' '  Free  traders  renounce  all  logic  and  facts  when  discussing  their 
favorite  dogma:  thej'  are,  indeed,  the  most  disingenuous  of  argu- 
ers.  I  declare,  that,  as  constantly  as  I  have  heard  the  subject  dis- 
cussed, I  never  once  heard  a  free  trader  have  the  honesty  to  attribute 
the  increased  trade  of  the  world  in  general,  and  of  England  as  part 
of  it,  to  its  true  causes,  viz.,  the  vast  increase  in  the  circulating 
medium  and  the  general  application  of  steam,  but  always  to  what 
tliey  choose  to  call  free  trade.  To  ignore  these  illimitable  agencies, 
and  to  ascribe  all  progress  to  the  pigmy  efforts  of  a  small  school 
of  political  economists  in  England,  is  to  reverse  the  old  proverb, 
and  to  imagine  the  mouse  bringing  forth  the  mountain. 

"The  increased  foreign  commerce  of  England,  during  the  last 
twenty  years,  is  attributed  to  her  free  trade  policy ;  and  we  are 
led,  by  implication,  to  understand  that  .she  is  the  only  nation  that 
has  advanced  in  commercial  activity  during  that  period. 

' '  Free  traders  point  with  triumph  to  our  board  of  trade  returns 
of  exports  and  imports,  and  exclaim  triumphantly,  This  is  our 
doing  ;  but  they  ignore  the  fact — it  cannot  be  through  ignorance — 
that  the  board  of  trade  returns  in  France,  Switzerland,  Prussia, 
Belgium,  and  Austria,  show  results  far  more  satisfactory,  a  pro- 
portionate increase  of  trade  far  exceeding  our  own. 

"  Take  France,  for  instance,  as  being  our  nearest  neighbor,  and 
compare  her  wealth  and  commercial  position  now  with  what  it 
was  twenty  years  ago,  and  it  will  at  once  be  gi'anted  that,  how 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  35 

ever  great  may  be  the  blessings  of  free  trade,  sound  progi'ess  ia 
not  incompatible  with  the  strictest  protection.  The  bullion  in  the 
Bank  of  France  is  now,  in  1869,  forty-seven  millions, — twenty- 
seven  millions  higher  than  it  was  in  1844,  and  sixteen  millions 
higher  than  in  1853  :  the  bullion  in  the  Bank  of  England  is  seven- 
teen millions, — two  millions  higher  than  in  1844,  three  millions 
less  than  in  1853  ! 

"In  France,  in  1868,  the  exports  and  imports  balanced  within 
twenty  millions.  In  England,  the  excess  of  imports  was  over 
sixty  millions  !  and  in  1869  it  will,  in  all  probability,  reach  one 
hundred  millions." 

In  the  Nineteenth  Century  (a  leading  London  Maga- 
zine) of  August,  1881,  Sir  Edward  Sullivan  has  an 
article  on  "Isolated  Free  Trade,"  from  which  an 
extract  shows  the  feeling  against  free  trade  of  many 
English  workmen  : 

"The  organization  of  the  working  classes  is  veiy  complete  and 
very  strong,  and  at  this  moment  the  whole  of  it  is  being  concen- 
trated on  this  point.  Already  a  number  of  operatives,  far  more 
than  is  necessary  to  turn  a  general  election,  have,  through  their 
delegates,  given  in  their  adherence  to  the  Fair  Trade  League. 

"The  workingmen  are  not  working  out  the  question  by  the 
abstract  reasoning  of  others,  but  by  their  own  experience ;  they 
know  nothing  of  political  economy,  but  they  know  what  were 
the  promises  of  the  apostles  of  free  trade,  and  they  know  what 
are  the  results.  Bankers  and  brokers  and  dealers  in  stocks  and 
importers  of  foreign  manufactures  may  tell  them  that  they  are 
fools  and  do  not  know  when  they  are  well  off.  That  may  be  so, 
but  they  know  when  they  are  badly  off,  and  they  are  badly  off 
now. 

"The  reports  of  their  delegates  state  that  a  very  large  propor- 
tion of  the  operative  population  of  Great  Britain  (they  put  it  at 
one-third)  is  out  of  work  ;  that  the  rest  have  not,  on  an  average, 
more  than  four  days'  work  a  week  ;  that  for  five  or  six  years  they 
have  been  consirming  their  savings  and  the  funds  of  their  trade 
societies.  One  rich  trade  society  has  paid  no  less  than  £200,000 
in  'work  pay '  during  the  last  five  years,  and  reduced  its  capital 
to  less  than  £100,000. 


36  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

"  Whatever  the  wealth  of  the  country  may  be,  it  has  not  pene- 
trated down  to  them.  Every  year  tliis  wealth  is  accumulating 
into  fewer  hands  ;  every  year  the  gulf  between  rich  and  poor 
becomes  deeper  and  broader.  It  is  calculated  that  there  are  at 
this  moment  14,500,000  of  the  people  with  less  than  10.s\  6rZ.  a 
week  to  live  on.  The  operatives  look  abroad,  and  they  see  and 
hear  from  their  mates  what  is  the  condition  of  national  wealth  in 
France  and  America,  that  there  the  fertilizing  stream  has 
descended  to  all  classes,  and  they  find  the  very  reverse  is  the 
case  :  that  wealth  is  daily  becoming  more  generally  distributed, 
that  every  year  the  gulf  between  rich  and  poor  is  getting  naiTOwer 
and  shallower.  They  see  and  hear  that  the  operatives  in  France 
and  America  have  far  steadier  work,  higher  wages  in  proportion, 
and  are  increasing  more  rapidly  in  material  prosperity  than  the 
work-people  of  Great  Britain,  and  they  are  beginning  to  ask  why. 
They  know  that  they  are,  man  for  man,  as  good  as  their  rivals  ; 
that  in  mechanical  skill,  in  aptitude  for  hard  work,  in  mineral 
wealth,  in  national  capital,  &c.,  they  are  their  superiors.  Why, 
then,  are  they  not  equally  advancing  in  material  prosperity  ? 

"The  stock  arguments  of  the  big  loaf,  the  natural  antagonism 
between  producers  and  consumers,  between  employers  and 
employed,  &c.,  have  been  disproved  by  the  rate  and  reality  of  the 
American  progress. 

"'I  can  hardly  allow  myself  to  believe,'  said  Lord  Derby, 
'  that  America  will  long  maintain  at  the  piiblic  expense  a  privi- 
leged class  of  manufacturers  and  jDroducers.'  But  the  American 
people  laugh  at  this  ;  they  know  that  every  prosperous  manufac- 
tm'er  means  a  hundred  or  two  of  prosperous  workmen,  and 
every  ruined  manufacturer,  one  or  two  hundred  ruined  workmen  ; 
that  if  the  employer  is  losing  money  the  employed  cannot  be 
making  it.  More  than  this,  they  understand  that  manufacturing 
and  agricultural  industries  are  inseparably  bound  up  together, 
that  prosperous  manufactures  mean  prosperous  agriculture,  and 
•oice  versa ;  that  each  consumes  what  the  other  produces ;  that 
each  is  the  best  customer  to  the  other." 

Otlier  ahle  English  writers  have  sent  ont  like  pamphlets 
and  books,  largely  read.  "Tlie  Stagnation  of  Trade; 
Its   Causes  and   Cure,"  by  K.    Burn,  of   Manchester ; 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  87 

**  Free  Trade  a  Gigantic  Mistake,"  by  James  Roberts  ; 
*'  Sophisms  of  Free  Trade,"  by  Sir  J.  B.  Boyle,  are 
among  these.* 

Able  articles  have  been  published  in  newspapers,  of 
which  an  extract  from  a  letter  to  the  Sheffield  Telegraph 
by  Mr.  Wood,  a  manufacturer,  may  serve  as  a  specimen: 

"In  1868  the  excess  of  our  imports  over  exports  reached  the 
ruinous  sum  of  £116,042,000  ($580,000,000)  more  bj^  £13,000,000 
than  the  whole  export  of  textile  manufactures.  What  must  be 
the  effect  of  free  admission  of  362, 820  clocks  and  watches  ;  7, 757,  - 
000  yards  of  cottons  ;  404,544  hundred  weight  of  glass;  468,240 
pairs  of  shoes  ;  10,714  pairs  of  gloves  ;  3,866,130  pounds  of  silks  ; 
2,261,000  pounds  of  woolen  and  worsted  yarns  ?  What  amount 
of  labor  would  not  these  articles  have  found  for  our  half-starved 
people  ?  While  certain  articles,  such  as  tea,  coffee,  sugar,  etc., 
which  we  cannot  produce,  are  admitted  at  heavy  duties,  other 


*In  a  London  pamphlet  by  A.  McEwen,  in  1879,  it  is  stated  that  the  British 
Board  of  Trade  Reports  make  the  excess  of  imports  over  exports  for  the 
four  years,  1875-8,  four  hundred  and  eighty  million  pounds  sterling,  or 
$3,400,000,000.  Mr.  Mongredien  counts  merchants'  and  carriers'  profits,  and 
brings  it  down  to  $1,155,000,000;  which  McEwen  accepts,  but  tliinks  too  low. 
Hon.  L.  H.  Dudley,  late  U.  S.  consul  at  Liverpool,  makes  the  excess  of 
British  imports  over  exports  for  ten  years,  1870-9,  $4,104,618,701,  and  says 
the  balance  was  against  her  every  year.  He  gives  the  excess  of  United 
States  exports  over  imports  in  the  same  ten  years  at  $329,951, 5ii3.  They 
bought  immensely  more  than  they  sold,  while  we  sold  more  than  we 
bought.     In  the  long  run  the  tide  sets  against  free  trade  England. 

A  favorite  mode  of  some  English  writers  to  show  the  alleged  prosperity 
which  free  trade  has  brought  their  country  is  to  give  statistics  of  their  trade, 
and  leave  out  comparisons  avith  that  o/  other  countries.  Mongredieu,  for 
instance,  says:  "In  1840  the  foreign  trade  of  the  United  Kingdom  (exports 
and  imports  combined)  was  £172,133,000;  In  1878  it  amounted  to  £614,255,000, 
a  marvelous  rate  of  increase." 

The  foreign  trade  of  the  United  States  in  1840  was  $202,846,941;  in  1878  it 
reached  $1,153,809,201.  That  is,  the  British  trade  increased  3.50  per  cent.,  but 
the  American  trade  over  500  per  cent.  If  the  flr.st  was  a  "marvelous 
increase  "  under  free  trade,  the  last  was  a  much  more  marvelous  increase 
under  protection  througli  most  of  the  time,  and  far  the  larger  part  of  thai 
increase  from  1864  to  IS'IS,  our  period  of  permanent  protection. 

The  trade  of  protective  France  increased  in  a  greater  ratio  than  that  of 
England  in  the  same  period. 


38  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

articles,  which  we  can  produce,  and  our  countrymen  are  literally 
dying  to  produce,  are  admitted  free,  such  as  silks,  woolens, 
watches,  clocks,  etc.  ****** 

"  At  this  moment  about  one  in  every  eighteen  persons  in  England 
and  "Wales  is  in  receipt  of  parochial  relief.  For  pauperism  in 
1853  £4,929,000  was  paid;  in  1868  £7,500,000.  Since  1853  upwards 
of  3,000,000  of  our  people  have  emigrated,  'principally  to  extreme 
'protective  countries,  whpre  their  labor  has  found  better  reward." 

There  is  a  moiTi-nful  pathos  in  the  address  of  a  meeting 
of  iron-workers  in  South  Staffordshire  to  their  employ- 
ers.    They  say  : 

"  We  ask  you,  gentlemen,  can  you  expect  that  we  will  continue, 
'like  dumb,  driven  cattle,'  to  accept  with  indifference  the  present 
state  of  things  as  if  we  had  become  '  living  dead  men  ?'  The  low 
price  of  labor  and  the  high  price  of  living  has  driven  and  is  driving 
your  best  workmen  from  the  country,  to  compete  with  us  in  the 
labor  markets  of  the  world." 

Proof  of  this  distress  comes  from  other  sotirces.  In 
an  article  in  the  London  Contemporary  Revie^o,  July, 
1880,  by  an  American,  Mr.  Herbert  J.  Leffingwell,  he 
says  :  "  Is  it  true,  as  the  Earl  of  Carnvaron  stated  last 
winter  in  the  House  of  Lords,  that  the  amount  of  disas- 
ters and  poverty  is  greater  than  has  been  known  for  a 
long  time?  Is  it  true,  that,  by  the  register  general's 
reports,  one  person  in  every  thirty-six  in  England  and 
Wales  is  a  pauper  ?"  The  London  Daily  Telegraph,  in 
July,  1879,  said:  "  Scores  of  destitute  men  and  women, 
usually  of  advanced  age,  utterly  homeless,  die  from 
cold  and  hunger  in  the  streets  of  London  every  year. " 

In  a  speech  in  the  United  States  Senate,  in  Decem- 
ber, 1881,  Hon.  J.  S.  Morrill  spoke  of  "five  thousand 
houses  now  marked  '  to  let '  in  Slieffield,  and  ten  thou- 
sand in  Birmingham,"  and  a  decrease  in  the  total  of 
British  exports  and  imports  from  1873  to  1880  of  $350,- 
000,000  are  painful  j^roofs  of  decreased  prosijerity. 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion,  39 


THE    COBDEN^    CLUB. 

Great  Britain  is  poor  in  agricultural  resources,  with 
a  narrow  island  territory,  land  in  few  hands  and  rented 
to  tenants,  a  dense  population  which  its  farms  cannot 
feed,  and  magnificent  deer  parks  stretching  for  miles 
around  the  palaces  of  titled  noblemen,  while  the  poor 
pine  in  want  in  sight  of  their  enchanting  but  jealously- 
giiarded  borders. 

•  It  is  estimated  that  she  must  import  food  valued  at 
$800,000,000  yearly,  and  raw  materials  (cotton,  &c.,)  to 
use  in  her  manufactures  valued  at  about  $050,000,000, 
and  export  $1,200,000,000  worth  of  manufactures. 
Her  very  life  depends  on  cheap  food,  cheap  raw  mate- 
rials, and  a  wide  command  of  the  world's  markets ; 
and  it  is  held  of  vital  importance  by  her  leading  busi- 
ness men  that  free  trade  sentiments  should  spread  over 
the  world,  that  England  may  crush  out  competing 
foreign  manufactures.  To  this  end  the  Cobden  Club 
was  formed,  bearing  the  name  of  a  great  Englishman 
identified  with  free  trade,  and  greatly  respected  for  cer- 
tain noble  qualities.  This  club  has  among  its  members 
two  hundred  members  of  Parliament,  several  Cabinet 
Ministers,  and  some  sixty  persons  from  the  United 
States,  or  twice  as  many  as  from  any  other  country. 

It  aims  to  enlist  the  power  of  rank,  of  education  and 
ability,  and  of  social  and  political  influence. 

Especial  care  is  taken  to  have  an  array  of  members 
from  this  country.  A  leading  object  is  to  convert  the 
United  States  to  free  trade,  or  at  least  to  unsettle  and 
damage  our  tariff,  or  keep  up  an  agitation,  and  so 
check  our  manufactures.  This  is  not  strange  in  view  of 
the  magnitude  of  our  trade  and  the  pressure  of  British 


40  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

necessity  for  it.  Our  imports  from  Great  Britain  for 
ten  years  preceding  1876  were  $1,813,000,000.  To  keep 
this  immense  trade  is  life,  to  decrease  it  is  disaster,  to 
lose  it  is  death.  Hence  the  sending  of  Cobden  Club 
tracts  by  car-loads  over  the  West  and  South,  the  visits 
of  English  members  of  Parliament  to  this  country,  and 
the  formation  of  free  trade  leagues  and  clubs. 

Lord  Derby  presided  at  the  Cobden  Club  dinner  in 
London,  in  July,  1881,  and  said  in  his  speech,  that 
*'  sooner  or  later  free  trade  must  become  a  sectional 
question  in  the  United  States."  Doubtless  this  aris- 
tocratic nobleman  would  like  to  make  it  such,  and  hence 
his  assertion. 

The  purpose  and  aim  of  certain  classes  m  England  is 
to  break  down  our  manufactures,  or  to  check  their  pro- 
gress, which  is  so  necessary  to  sup^/ly  the  constantly 
increasing  wants  of  our  growing  millions,  and  thus  make 
room  for  the  products  of  British  factories.  It  is  the 
same  spirit  and  system  by  which  they  opened  China  to 
the  vile  opium  trade,  of  which  the  British  government 
hud  the  monopoly,  but  the  methods  are  different.  We 
are  too  strong  to  be  pushed  into  free  trade  at  the  bay- 
onet point,  and  so  a  pamphlet  war  is  carried  on,  and  the 
army  of  invasion  is  made  up  of  Cobden  Club  tracts  and 
other  like  craft. 

There  is  no  European  nation  except  the  English 
that  endeavors  to  interfere  with  the  domestic  affairs  of 
this  country.  The  breaking  down  of  our  system  would 
be  very  much  for  the  interest  of  the  French,  Germans, 
Swiss,  Italians,  and  Eussians,  as  well  as  for  that  of  the 
English,  but  we  hear  of  no  plans  in  either  of  those  coun- 
tries for  an  offensive  intermeddling  with  our  affairs. 
Many  Englishmen  seem  to  be  fully  persuaded  that  the 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  41 

Americans  know  nothing  of  political  economy,  and  that 
they  are  utterly  incompetent  to  manage  their  own  affairs  ; 
and  they  do  not  hesitate  to  say  so  frankly. 

At  a  recent  Cobden  Club  meeting  it  was  said  that 
nearly  a  million  free  trade  pamphlets  had  been  sent 
to  this  country  within  a  few  years  and  largely  used  in 
our  congressional  campaigns.  That  club  has  also  offered 
prizes  of  gold  and  silver  medals  for  the  best  essays  on 
political  economy— free  trade  of  course— by  students  in 
American  colleges.  Suppose  a  protective  tariff  club  in 
New  York  should  send  their  tracts  to  England  and  offer 
prizes  to  the  Cambridge  and  Oxford  university  students 
for  the  best  essays  on  protection.  Our  British  cousins 
would  say:  ''Mind  your  own  business!" — and  with 
good  reason. 


WE   MUST   PROTEST. 


The  bonds  of  a  common  race  and  language  are  to  be 
borne  in  mind  ;  the  warm  sympathy  betAveen  us  and  the 
people  of  Great  Britain  on  some  important  subjects  to 
be  kept  alive  ;  the  great  service  done  us  in  our  days  of 
trial  by  eminent  Englishmen — some  of  them  leading 
fi-ee  traders — is  to  be  held  in  fit  honor  ;  l)ut  we  must  be 
just  to  ourselves,  and  make  strong  protest  against  the 
unjust  and  selfish  policy  of  British  free  trade. 

A  Parliament  Commission,  in  1854,  in  a  report  on  the 
mining  population,  spoke  of  "immense  losses  wbich 
employers  incur  in  bad  times,  in  order  to  destroy  foreign 
competition,  and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign 
markets,"  of  works  being  carried  on  for  this  purpose 
*'at  an  aggregate  loss  of  three  or  four  hundred  thousand 
pounds  sterling,"  and  of  the  ability  of  a  few  wealthy 
canitalists  *'  to  overwhelm  all  foreign  competition,"  and 


42  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

•thus  "  stc])  in  for  the  wliolc  trade  when  prices  revive."' 
As  an  illustration  of  this  process — very  costly  to  us 
and  equally  profitable  to  these  British  capitalists — let  us 
look  at  the  trade  in  railroad  iron  from  1840  to  1854. 
First,  these  men  had  spent  money  here  largely  to  break 
down  our  tariff  of  1842,  and  get  instead  the  lower  tariff 
of  1846,  Avitli  its  ad  valorem  rates,  under  which  frauds 
in  the  importer's  invoice  could  push  duties  down. 
Then  in  1849  and  1850  more  than  200,000  tons  of  rail- 
road iron  was  pushed  into  the  country  at  140  per  ton, 
and  our  mills  at  home  closed  up  and  their  business 
ruined.  This  was  the  plot  to  "gain  and  keep  the 
market,"  and  the  harvest  was  at  hand.  From  1850  to 
1854  the  British,  controlling  the  market  and  running 
up  the  price,  sold  us  800,000  tons  of  railroad  iron  at 
$75  per  ton. 

With  an  adequate  protection,  our  own  mills  could 
have  furnished  the  iron  at  $50  per  ton  ;  but  for  want  of 
it  they  were  stopped,  and  thus  $60,000,000  went  into 
the  hands  of  British  capitalists,  and  soon  came,  inevi- 
tably, the  terrible  distress  of  the  crisis  of  1857. 

It  is  easy  to  find,  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  interested 
parties,  and  honest  free  traders  sincerely  devoted  to  a 
delusion,  to  co-operate  with  the  Cobden  Club. 

ENGLISH     CONTRIBUTORS     TO     FREE     TRADE     FUNDS     IN 
NEW   YORK. 

In  May,  1869,  the  American  Free  Trade  League  in 
New  York  raised  $42,000,  and  published  a  list  of  con- 
tributors. Among  these  were  A.  B.  Sands  &  Co.,  drug- 
importers,  relatives  of  Baring  Brothers,  London  bankers, 
$6,257 ;  H.  Marshall,  agent  Black  Ball  Line  Liver- 
]»ool   Packets,   and  foreign   bankers,  $5,500  ;  Griniu'll, 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  4S 

Minturn  &  Co.,  ship  owners,  Mintnrn  brother-in-law  to 
Baring,  $3,800 ;  Mr.  Pell,  of  Liverpool  and  London 
Globe  Insurance  Co. ,  $842  ;  Nay  lor  &  Co. ,  English  steel 
house,  1500 ;  Mall  &  Co.,  importers,  Mall  Belgian 
Consul,  1500  ;  and  so  on  up  to  $30,000  pledged  by  such 
men.  The  reason  why  these  gentlemen  of  foreign  line- 
age or  connections  are  so  especially  solicitous  and  liberal 
in  this  matter  is  not  far  to  seek.  The  London  Mining 
Journal  says :  "If  this  League  succeeds,  we  may  hojje 
for  a  very  large  trade  from  that  country."  This  solves 
the  mystery.  It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  New  York 
is  the  centre  from  whence  goes  out  aid  and  comfort  to 
free  trade  efforts  all  over  the  land.  Were  it  not  for  such 
help,  there  would  be  little  agitation.  It  is  not  sponta- 
neous, does  not  spring  up  among  the  people,  but  ia 
fanned  into  forced  life  by  aid  of  interested  parties 
largely  English.  The  Philadelphia  Press  says  that  the 
New  York  Journal  of  Commerce  (free  trade)  admitted 
that  "nine-tenths  of  the  money  pledged  to  the  New 
York  Free  Trade  League  comes  from  foreigners." 

BARLT   ENGLISH    FEAR   OF    OUR    MANUFACTURES. 

English  solicitude  touching  our  manufactures  is  of 
early  date.  In  1817  the  House  of  Commons  declared, 
"that  the  erecting  manufactories  in  the  colonies 
tended  to  lessen  their  dependence  upon  Great  Britain." 
The  Board  of  Trade  and  Plantations,  in  1731-32,  in 
pursuance  of  an  order  of  the  House  of  Commons  to 
inquire  into  the  industrial  affairs  of  the  plantations, 
charged  that  in  New  England,  New  York,  Pennsylvania, 
and  Maryland, — "in  the  colonies  northward  of  Vir- 
ginia,"— the  colonies  "had  fallen  into  the  manufact- 
ure "  ot  woolen  and  linen  cloth ;  that  they  raised  flax 


44  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

and  hemp,  which  they  manufactured  into  **a  coarse 
sort  of  cloth,  bags,  traces,  and  halters,"  to  supply  the 
domestic  demand ;  that  they  had  established  woolen 
mills  for  domestic  manufactures,  and  that  linen  and 
cotton,  for  shirting,  were  made;  that  they  "man- 
ufactured brown  hollands  for  women's  wear,"  and 
that  the  Assembly  of  Massachusetts  had  voted  a  bounty 
of  thirty  shillings  for  every  piece  of  duck  or  canvas 
manufactured  in  the  province  ;  that  great  quantities  of 
hats  and  leather  were  manufactured  and  exported  to 
Spain,  Portugal,  and  the  West  Indies ;  that  in  Massa- 
chusetts they  had  set  up  a  paper-mill ;  that  they  had 
established  iron  works,  six  furnaces  and  nineteen  forges, 
and  one  slitting  mill,  for  the  manufacture  of  bar  iron, 
and  of  "  cast  iron,  or  hollow  ware," — all  sorts  of  iron 
for  ships," — and  "a  manufactory  for  nails;"  and  that 
they  'M)uilt  many  brigantines  and  small  sloops,"  which 
they  sold  in  the  West  Indies, 

All  this  was  very  bad  in  the  opinion  of  the  British 
Parliament,  and   they  passed  severe   preventive  laws. 

The  exportation  from  England  of  artisans  or  tools  for 
making  woolens,  silk,  or  iron,  was  prohibited.  Lord 
Gobham  said  the  colonists  should  not  even  make  a  horse- 
nail.  In  1750  pig  iron  from  this  country  was  admitted 
free  into  British  ports,  to  be  worked  into  finer  forms 
there,  but  the  erection  or  "continuance"  of  any  iron 
mill  here  forbidden  under  penalty  of  from  £200  to  £500. 
One  great  grievance  of  our  forefathers  in  those  colo- 
nial days  was  the  persistent  resolve  of  the  mother 
country  to  crush  our  manufactures,  and  so  keep  us  poor 
and  dependent ;  and  to  escape  from  this  was  a  leading 
motive  for  declaring  our  national  independence. 


British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion.  45 


HANDS    OFF  ! 

We  may  wish  Great  Britain  such  success  as  the  skill 
and  persistent  vigor  of  her  people  are  entitled  to  ;  such 
share  of  the  world's  work  and  trade  as  she  can  fairly 
win ;  but  when  she  seeks  to  paralyze  our  enterprise,  crip- 
ple our  industry,  and  degrade  our  civilization  by  propa- 
gating in  our  midst  the  delusions  of  British  free  trade, 
we  must  cry  out :     Hands  off  ! 

One  significant  fact  should  be  borne  in  mind.  The 
policy  urged  by  American  free  traders  has  the  full  sym- 
pathy and  support  of  British  traders  and  manufactur- 
ers, because  it  is  for  their  benefit. 

This  intermeddling,  this  profuse  advice  thrust  on  us 
uncalled  for,  as  though  we  were  incompetent  and  foolish, 
this  greed  of  gain  under  the  guise  of  philanthropic  wish 
for  our  good,  we  must  repel  and  repudiate. 

Of  such  intermeddling  the  Chicago  Westerti  Mamifact- 
urer,  of  October  18,  1881,  gives  proofs.  It  tells  how 
one  Professor  Sheldon  from  London  called  at  the  office 
of  "one  of  the  leading  agricultural  journals  in  that  city  " 
and  urged  its  editor  to  publish  "  entire  or  in  abstract  in 
his  columns"  the  Mongredien  Western  Farmer  pam- 
phlet, especially  that  portion  of  it  urging  those  farmers 
"  to  give  their  support  to  no  candidate  for  Congress  who 
does  not  pledge  himself,  if  elected,  to  propose  or  vote  for 
the  abolition  of  import  duties."  To  his  honor  the  editor 
decidedly  declined  this  cool  proposal. 

The  Manufacturer  also  says  : 

' '  Another  agent  and  correspondent  of  the  Cobden  Club,  duly 
delegated,  one  Professor  Bigclow  of  New  York,  was  in  this  city  a 
day  or  two  recently,  consulting  with  local  free  traders.  He  was 
going  to  Indiana,  well  supplied  with  British  pamphlets,  with  which 


'46  British  Free  Trade  a  Delusion. 

he  proposed  to  influence  votes  against  candidates  for  Congress 
wlio  were  not  pledged  to  propose  or  vote  for  the  abolition  of 
import  duties,  if  elected." 

Suppose  American  protective  tariff  agents  in  England 
meddling  with  an  election  and  spreading  documents. 
All  England  would  ring  with  denunciations  of  Yankee 
interference,  and  the  poor  agents  would  beat  a  hasty 
retreat. 

The  people  of  this  country  are  led  by  these  things  to 
suspect  that  whenever  a  free  trade  crusade  starts  here, 
no  matter  how  carefully  hidden  the  wires  may  be,  an 
Englishman  stands  at  the  other  end  of  the  line. 


CHAPTER  YI. 

THE  FREE  TRADE  FALSEHOOD,  THAT  A  PROTECTIVE 
TARIFF  IS  A  TAX  ON  THE  CONSUMER,  REFUTED. 

It  is  a  constant  and  emphatic  assertion  of  free  trad- 
ers that  a  jirotective  tariff  taxes  the  consumer.  They 
assume  that  the  duty  on  an  imported  article  is  added 
to  its  price,  at  the  cost  of  the  buyer,  and  added  also  to 
the  price  of  like  articles  made  here.  If,  for  instance, 
we  import  50,000  yards  of  a  certain  kind  of  woolen 
cloth,  with  a  duty  of  fifty  cents  per  yard,  and  make 
200,000  yards  of  the  same  kind  at  home,  that  duty  is 
added  to  the  price  of  both  the  imported  and  domestic 
goods,  and  the  buyers  pay  $75,000  extra ;  of  which 
government  gets  $25,000,  and  $50,000  goes  to  the  pro- 
tected home  manufacturers,  who  thus  craftily  enrich 
themselves,  while  professing  to  benefit  the  people  they 
rob.  This  is  held  up  as  the  alleged  effect  and  lasting 
result  of  what  Professor  Perry  calls  "our  iniquitous 
and  accursed  tariff." 

Tins  assertion  is  a  gross  assumption,  imtlwut  proof 
and  contrary  to  fact,  and  is  u^^lield  as  the  strong  hold  of 
the  free  trade  argument.  Doubtless  there  are  those 
who  honestly  hold  it  true,  but  it  is  false  in  origin  and 
deceptive  in  aim. 

On  the  contrary,  facts  in  this  chapter  will  prove  this 
statement :  No  protective  duty  was  ever  levied  on  a 
single  article,  the  home  manufacture  of  which  grew  to 

47  ■ 


•±8  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

large  proportions  under  that  duty,  ivitliout  the  price  to 
the  consumer  growing  cheaper, — the  duty  thus  being  a 
boon  instead  of  a  tax. 

To  treat  a  tariff  as  a  tax  is  a  shrewd,  yet  shallow 
device.  George  Basil  Dixwell,  of  Boston,  reviewing 
Professor  Sumner  on  "Protective  Taxes,"  says: 

"A  tax  is  not  necessarily  a  burtlien.  If  the  money  be  well 
spent,  and  give  us  good  roads,  water  works,  police,  and  good 
government,  at  what  they  ought  to  cost,  then  a  tax  is  a  great 
blessing  ;  but,  unfortunately,  the  money  is  often  spent  recklessly 
and  foolishly,  and  so,  through  abuse,  the  very  name  of  tax 
becomes  offensive.  The  free  trader  avails  himself  of  this  exist- 
ing prejudice,  with  the  effect  of  disgusting  the  reader  with  pro- 
tection at  the  outset,  in  advance  of  all  argument.  The  word  tax 
also  gives  two  false  impressions :  first,  that  all  protected  articles 
cost  the  consumer  more  than  they  would  if  not  protected  ;  and 
second,  that  when  they  cost  more,  the  consumer  gets  no  counter- 
balancing or  greatly  overbalancing  advantages." 

With  brief  preliminaries,  let  us  ''to  the  law  and  the 
testimony,"  for  this  case  is  to  be  settled  by  facts,  not 
by  assertions.  In  a  free  trade  meeting  in  this  city  the 
speaker  said,  with  an  air  of  confident  assurance*  "Of 
course  the  duty  is  added  to  the  prices,  for  the  importer 
pays  it,  adds  it  to  the  cost  of  his  goods,  and  then  sells 
them  as  cheap  as  makers  here  sell  theirs."  To  tell  half 
the  truth  and  ignore  the  rest  is  a  sharp  lawyer's  way  to 
win  his  case,  but  is  not  a  full  or  fair  statement.  He 
ignored  the  fact  that  our  competition  compels  the 
foreign  maker  and  the  importer  to  reduce  their  prices, 
and  that  we  reap  the  benefit, — a  benefit  impossible  with- 
out such  competition  by  our  home  industries,  built  up 
under  protection. 

Let  up  put  an  English  statement  in  contrast  with  this 
free  trade  assertion.     Kobert  P.  Porter,  a  member  of  the 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  49 

tariff  commission,  no^y  a  correspondent  of  the  Neiv  York 
Tribu7ie,  from  England,  especially  describing  the  indus- 
trial condition  of  Great  Britain,  in  a  letter  from  Brad- 
ford, the  center  of  the  great  worsted  industry,  says  : 

"  If  I  were  asked  what  the  keen  practical  Bradford  manufact- 
urer thought  on  economic  questions,  I  should  frankly  reply  that 
after  an  experience  of  a  generation  some  of  them  are  prepared  to 
prove  that  tariff  duties  come  vwre  largely  oat  of  the  producer  than 
tJie  consumer.  Some  of  them  demonstrated  this  quite  conclusively 
to  me.     One  of  the  most  prominent  said  : 

"  '  The  truth  is,  the  higher  the  foreign  tariff  the  lower  we  must 
make  our  goods  and  the  less  we  can  afford  to  pay  labor.  The 
least  possible  reduction  in  the  United  States  tariff  will  be  a  grand 
thing  for  Bradford,  but  how  it  will  affect  your  industries  I  can 
hardly  say.  We  are  obliged  to  sell  our  goods  in  France  for  the 
same  price  as  we  did  before  they  enacted  their  higher  tariff,  and 
the  Bradford  manufacturer  is  paying  that  duty,  not  the  French 
consumers  of  the  goods.  I  know  from  practical  experience  what 
I  am  talking  about.'  " 

In  a  speech  in  Cooper  Institute,  Feb.  1,  1883,  Dexter 
A.  Hawkins,  an  eminent  New  York  lawyer,  said  : 

"Some  years  ago  I  attended  by  invitation  the  monthly  meeting 
of  the  Hardware  Trade  at  Sheffield.  England. 

"  Their  exports  then  were  chiefly  to  this  country. 

"An  eminent  manufacturer,  in  addressing  the  meeting,  inveighed 
with  great  bitterness  against  the  American  tariff.  He  said  he  had 
examined  the  question  with  great  care,  and  such  examination 
demonstrated  that  the  English  manufacturer  was  paying  at  least 
one-half  of  the  tariff  on  all  the  goods  he  exported  to  America ; 
and  they  must  break  down  our  tariff,  at  whatever  cost,  or  it  would 
build  up  American  rivals  to  the  extent,  at  least,  of  supplying 
entirely  our  home  market,  and  then  England  would  have  to  pay 
the  whole  tariff  or  lose  the  market ;  and  when  that  point  was 
reached,  she  would  have  to  compete  with  the  American  manufact- 
m-er  in  every  foreign  market,  then  her  own  almost  exclusively. 

"Another  English  manufacturer  a  few  years  ago,  while  lobby- 
ing at  Washington  against  our  tariff,  confessed  to  a  free  trade 


50  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

congressman  that  the  protective  tariff  duties,  in  the  long  run,  came 
ahnost  wholly  out  of  the  foreign  producer  ;  that  if  they  only  came 
out  of  the  domestic  consumer  the  foreign  manufacturer  would  not 
care  a  button  about  our  tariff  laws." 

Such  testimonies  outweigh  the  sj^ecial  plea,  the  aim 
of  which  was  to  make  a  fragment  of  tlie  case  appear 
as  the  whole.  A  half  truth  is  more  deceptive  tlian  a 
bare  falsehood. 

The  grave  Senator  in  Washington  declares  with  pon- 
derous solemnity  :  ''A  tariff  is  a  tax,  added  to  the  price 
of  all  articles  on  which  it  is  levied,  and  it  com})cls  the 
j)eople  to  pay  the  same  added  cost  on  all  like  home  made 
articles."  The  shallow  politician  at  the  corner  grocery, 
the  boy  in  the  debate  at  the  country  school  house,  and 
the  college  professor  in  his  rhetorical  treatise  make  the 
same  assertion.  School-boy  and  professor  and  senator 
are  on  the  same  level.  They  remind  one  of  Mark 
Twain's  reply  to  an  invitation  to  lecture  before  an  agri- 
cultural society.  As  he  tells  the  story  he  wrote  them  : 
''Gentlemen,  I  am  happy  to  accept  your  invitation.  I 
think  myself  especially  qualified,  for  I  know  nothing 
about  agriculture. " 

Augustus  Mongredien,  in  his  British  tract,  "The 
Western  Farmer  of  America,"  (a  poor  affair,  lifted  into 
brief  im2)ortance  by  being  sent  over  here  and  widely  dis- 
tributed from  the  Cobden  Club  in  London,)  rolls  this 
statement  "like  a  sweet  morsel  under  his  tongue." 

With  a  complacency  only  equalled  by  the  effrontery  of 
the  assertion,  he  says  that  "  our  tariff  makes  the  over- 
charge our  western  farmers  have  to  ]xxy  for  all  the  manu- 
factured goods  tliey  consume  1400,000,000  yearly,"  which 
these  hardworking  people  "needlessly  and  heedlessly 
throw  away."  "The  average  duty  on  imports  is  the 
measure  of  the  difference  between  the  prices  they  pay 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  51 

and  what  they  would  pay  were  foreign  articles  admitted 
free."  This  is  the  Cohden  Club  voice,  echoed  by  Sena- 
tor and  schoolboy  alike.  From  this  comes  his  conclusion 
that  a  duty  for  revenue  only,  raised  on  articles  we  do 
not  produce,  may  be  a  necessity,  but  that  a  tariff  for 
protection  and  revenue,  raised  on  articles  we  import  and 
also  make  or  produce,  is  a  f]-aud  and  a  roljbery  of  the 
people.  This  is  assumption,  based  on  assertions  which 
facts  repudiate,  and  which  the  laws  of  trade  make  absurd. 

ALEXAXDER   HAMILTON". 

The  philosophy  of  the  whole  matter  was  well  given  l)y 
that  great  statesman,  Alexander  Hamilton,  in  his  famous 
report  in  1791,  as  secretary  of  the  treasury  : 

"But,  though  it  were  true  that  the  immediate  and  certain  effect 
of  a  tariff  was  an  increase  of  price,  it  is  universally  true  tliat  the 
contrary  is  the  ultimate  effect  with  every  successful  manufacture. 
When  a  domestic  manufacture  has  attained  to  perfection,  and  has 
engaged  in  the  prosecution  of  it  a  competent  number  of  persons, 
it  can  be  afforded,  and  accordingly  seldom  or  never  fails  to  be  sold 
cheaper,  in  process  of  time,  than  the  foreign  article  for  which  it  is 
a  substitute.  The  internal  competition  which  takes  place  soon 
does  away  with  everything  like  monopoly,  and  by  degrees  reduces 
the  price  of  the  article  to  the  minimum  of  a  reasonable  profit  on 
the  capital  employed.  This  accords  with  the  reason  of  the  thing 
-and  with  experience. " 

This  eminent  man  had  not  learned  that  a  tariff  is  a 
tax  on  the  consumer  !  Washington,  Jefferson,  Jackson, 
Webster,  and  other  great  men  were  in  equal  ignorance, 
and  so  advocated  tariff's  for  protection.  That  friend 
of  the  people,  Abraham  Lincoln,  declared  himself  an 
advocate  of  a  protective  tariff.  Professor  Reuleaux, 
president  of  the  German  Commission  at  our  Centen- 
nial Exposition,  went  home  and  said  :     "  The  present 


r 
52  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

condition  of  Anicrican  mannfacturcs  shows  the  fallacy  of 
the  free  trade  doctrine  that  the  prodnctions  of  a  country 
are  raised  in  price  by  protective  duties." 

Even  if  a  duty  sometimes  keeps  prices  up  for  a  brief 
time  compensations  come  at  once,  and  lower  prices  soon 
follow.  Free  traders  craftily  ignore  the  compensations; 
that  they  may  tlie  more  plausibly  deny  the  benefits.. 
Take,  for  instance,  the  Brinkerhotf  charge  that  $40,000,- 
000  went  into  the  pockets  of  our  iron  makers  in  1868,  as 
a  result  of  the  "  iniquitous  tax  "  imposed  on  the  people  by 
the  duty  on  iron,  and  grant  (what  is  not  true)  that  the 
l)rice  was  raised  that  amount.  Mr.  A.  S.  Hewitt,  in  his 
rei)ort  as  United  States  commissioner,  said:  "The  entire 
dilference  in  the  cost  of  making  iron  here  and  in  Eng- 
land is  the  wages,"  which  he  gave  as  87  cents  to  11.00 
per  day  there  and  |>2.00  here.  So  we  find  that  the 
Brinkerhoff  140,000,000  went  to  the  workmen,  and  the^ 
farmers  got  about  110,000,000  of  it. 

Napoleon  created  the  best  sugar  industry  in  France 
under  a  2)rohibitive  embargo.  Sugar  was  high,  but  it 
soon  fell,  and  hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons  of  beet, 
sugar  are  made  in  France  to-day,  practically  their  entire 
consumption,  and  it  is  exported  to  the  London  market. 

History  tells  the  same  story  in  different  countries, — 
the  building  up  of  vast  industries,  and  the  cheapening 
of  prices  under  protective  tariffs.  In  England  woolens 
formerly  had  a  high  tariff,  sometimes  a  prohibition,  and 
the  duty  on  iron  was  raised  a  score  of  times,  from  $2.50 
up  to  $35  per  ton,  and  'woolens  and  iron  cjrew  cheaper  all 
the  time.  If  tariff  is  a  tax,  they  should  have  gone 
up  higher  than  a  kite  ! 

It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  sole  aim  of  cheap- 
ness tends  to  inferiority  in  quality.     The  excellence  and 


The  Free  Trade  Faisehoud  Refuted.  53 

taste  of  French  goods  sell  them  everywhere.  We  have 
reached  a  like  excellence  in  some  manufactures,  and  it 
should  be  aimed  at  in  all,  for  the  best  goods  find  the 
best  markets.  "Cheap  and  nasty"  is  the  expressive 
phrase  applied  to  some  British  products.  The  London 
Times  says  : 

' '  The  Americans  succeed  in  supplanting  us  by  novelty  of  con- 
struction and  excellency  of  work.  They  do  not  attempt  to  under- 
sell us  in  the  mere  matter  of  price.  Our  goods  may  still  be  the 
cheapest,  but  they  are  no  longer  the  best ;  and  in  the  country 
where  an  «,xe,  for  instance,  is  an  indispensable  instrument,  the 
best  article  is  the  cheapest,  whatever  it  may  cost.  Settlers  and 
emigrants  soon  find  this  out,  and  they  have  found  it  out  to  the 
prejudice  of  Birmingham  trade. 

Our  American  silk  goods  rival  foreign  silks  in  excel- 
lence, and  begin  to  surpass  tlicm  in  genuineness — more 
silk  and  less  dye  stuffs. 

But  have  prices  in  the  United  States  gone  uj)  Avith 
protective  tariffs,  or  was  Hamilton  right  in  saying  that 
the  domestic  manufacture  "  seldom  or  never  fails  to  be 
sold  cheaper  in  process  of  time  than  the  foreign  article. 
*  *  *  The  internal  competition  soon  does  away  with 
monopoly  ?  " 

COTTOISr    MANUFACTURES. 

In  1860  our  cotton  manufactures  reached  1116,000,000 
in  value.  In  1880,  with  twenty  years  of  stable  protec- 
tion, their  value  was  1192,773,960,  employing  175,187 
operatives,  and  paying  $42,000,000  wages,  at  rates  forty 
per  cent,  higher  (see  Commercial  Bulletin)  than  in  1860. 

The  New  York  Secretary  of  the  Free  Trade  League 
asserted,  without  proof,  in  Chicago,  a  few  years  ago, 
that  spool-cotton  was  ''taxed  52  per  cent.,"  the  con- 
sumers paying  the  tax.     A  reliable  correspondent  of  the 


54  Tlie  Free  Tvade  Falsehood  llefuted. 

Hiirtford  (Ct.)  Post,  in  18G9,  made  the  following  st.ite- 
ment  in  reply, — liis  simple  facts  deniolisliing  the  asser- 
tion. That  the  case  stands  now  about  as  then,  is  ])roved 
by  the  export  of  our  spool  cotton  to  foreign  markets, 
where  its  superior  quality  is  prized.  The  Post  writer 
said  : 

"The  average  importation  of  spool-cotton  into  New  York  for 
three  consecutive  years  ending  June  30,  1861,  was  6,685,200 
dozen  per  annum,  and  under  a  dutj'^  of  24  per  cent,  ad  valorem, 
yielded  a  revenue  to  the  government  of  $365,063.04  per  annum. 

"The  importation  of  spool-cotton  into  New  York  in  1868  was. 
3,519,573  dozen  ;  duties  on  the  same,  |822,276.98. 

' '  We  have  no  data  to  show  the  importations  of  this  article  into 
other  ports  in  the  country,  but  will  suppose  it  to  be  500,000,  or  the 
whole  importation  of  the  year  to  be  4,000,000  dozen  ;  amount  of 
American  six-cord  thread  manufactured  in  1868,  2,000,000  dozen  ; 
amount  of  American  enameled  thread  manufactured,  8,000,000 
dozen. 

"It  appears  that  not  less  than  14,000,000 dozen  spool-cotton  will 
be  consumed  in  this  country  the  present  year,  more  than  two- 
thirds  of  which  is  of  American  manufacture. 

' '  Up  to  a  late  period  the  foreign  manuf actvu-ers  controlled  the' 
price  of  thread  in  our  market ;  at  present  the  American  manu- 
facturers control  the  price. 

"For  two  or  three  years  foreign  thread  remained  steady  at  $1.10 
to  $1.15  per  dozen  ;  it  is  now  selling  at  80  to  90  cents  per  dozen,  a 
decline  in  price  of  30  cents  per  dozen  in  two  years,  a  saving  to  the 
consumers  of  foreign  thread  of  $1,200,000  the  present  year,  while 
the  decline  in  the  price  of  American  spool-cotton,  owing  to  strong 
competition,  has  been  reduced  more  than  50  per  cent.,  a  still 
further  saving  of  $2,000,000.  The  following  is  a  summary  of 
the  results  of  a  high  duty  on  spool-cotton.  The  revenue  to  the 
government  has  been  more  than  doubled  ;  the  American  manu- 
facture of  thread  has  been  largely  increased,  while  the  price  of 
labor  in  these  thread  mills  is  still  as  high  as  duruig  the  war,  and 
the  consumers  of  thread  are  saving  $3,000,000  per  anninn  through 
the  strong  competition  which  has  sprung  up  between  the  Ameri- 
can and  foreign  manufacturers." 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted  55 


COTTO!^"    PIECE    GOODS. 

Cottons,  imported  at  fifty  cents  a  yard  before  our  mills 
were  built,  have  been  exported  at  six  cents  under  a  high 
tariff,  and  of  a  better  quality.  The  shrewd  Chinamen 
say  we  use  more  cotton  and  less  starch  than  the  English 
in  the  cloth  sent  to  them.  Cotton  hosiery  was  reduced 
in  price  nearly  one-half  from  1860  to  1868.  Delaines, 
formerly  imported  at  thirty-five  cents  to  fifty  cents,  were 
made  here  in  1868  at  twenty  cents  of  equal  quality. 

Our  brown,  bleached,  printed  and  dyed  cottons  com- 
pete with  the  English  in  foreign  lands,  and  tlie  prices 
are  lower  under  a  higher  tariff,  as  the  following  table 
shows:  * 

Articles.  1860.  1883. 

Standard  sheetings,  per  yard 8.73  cents      8.00  cents 

Standard  drillings,         "         8.92     "      •    8.00     " 

Bleached  shirtings,         "         15.50     "         13.35     " 

Printed  calicoes,  "         9.50     "  6.17     " 

Printing  cloths,  "         5.44     "  4.00     " 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  some  kinds  of  cotton  goods  are 
as  low  in  the  United  States  as  anywhere  in  the  world, 
how  foolish  the  assertion  that  the  normal  price  of  an 
article  is  its  American  price  minus  the  duty!  The  tariff 
on  standard  sheetings  is  57  per  cent.;  this  percentage 
from  8.00  cents  (the  price  above  quoted),  is  4.50  cents, 
leaving  the  alleged  foreign  price  3.40  cents  per  yard,  or 
less  than  half  what  it  is.  The  tariff  on  standard  cotton 
is  no  more  a  burthen  or  tax  on  the  home  consumer  tlian 
that  on  wheat  or  beef.  It  is  sim})ly  a  barrier  against  our 
market  being  flooded  by  English  goods  sent  at  less  than 

*  This  table,  and  that  on  woolens,  are  from  the  Boston  Commercial  Bul- 
letin. 


66  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

cost — their  ftivorite  game  ''to  break  down  competition 
and  step  in  for  tlie  whole  market  when  prices  revive. " 

This  cry  against  a  tariff  as  a  monstrous  tax  on  con- 
sumers was  the  staple  of  free  trade  speeches  in  1842;  and 
Henry  Clay,  in  his  Ealeigh  speech  in  1844,  told  how  a 
Western  farmer  *'  pricked  the  bubble  theory  with  the 
needle  fact.''''  The  demagogue  on  the  stump  cried  out 
to  him:  "Do  you  know,  my  friend,  that  these  tariff 
monopolists  make  you  pay  six  cents  a  yard  (the  duty) 
more  than  you  ought  for  the  shirt  on  your  back?"  The 
farmer  replied:  "I  suppose  it  must  be  so,  but  I  can't 
quite  see  how,  for  I  only  paid  five  and  a  half  cents  a 
yard  for  it." 

In  this  matter  of  cotton  goods  it  should  be  known 
that  the  raw  cotton  in  1876-81  was  two  to  three  cents  a 
pound  higher  than  in  1855-60,  and  wages  were  higher. 
Here  we  have  the  raw  material  higher,  the  duty  higher, 
wages  higher,  and  the  goods  lower. 

SILKS. 

By  the  census  it  appears  that  we  made  116,262,157 
worth  of  silks  of  all  kinds  in  1874,  and  134,410,463 
worth  in  1880  ;  paying  |9, 146,705  in  wages,  at  from 
$3.37  to  $24.71  per  week. 

W.  C.  Wykoft',  U.  S.  Census  Agent,  writes  as  follows: 
"It  may  be  stated  with  certainty  that  the  average 
decline  in  value  of  silk  goods  is  not  less  than  25  per 
cent.,  and  })robal)ly  over  30  per  cent.,  in  fifteen  years. 
*  *  *  Machine  twist  (sewing  silk  on  spools  for  use 
on  sewing  machines)  is  better  than  the  French  or  Italian. 
It  is  the  oldest  branch  of  our  silk  industry.  For  years 
its  manufacturers  have  been  engaged  in  the  severest 
com])etition,  both  as  to  cheapness  and  superior  quality. 


Tlte  Free  Trade  Fahehood  Refided.  57 

It  is  greatly  improved,  but  the  price  is  a  third  less." 
Here  is  sewing  silk  of  price  and  quality  distancing  for- 
eign competition,  yet  it  ought  to  be  high-priced,  for  the 
duty  of  some  40  jjer  cent,  ought  to  add  that  much  to  its 
cost.  Strange  to  say,  it  does  not !  The  stuif  has  gone 
down  instead  of  up  ! 


WOOL  AXD  WOOLENS. 

From  1850  to  18G0  the  sheep  in  our  countiy  increased 
but  little,  only  from  21,723,220  to  22,471,275.  In  1861 
the  "Morrill  tariff"  was  enacted,  and  in  1867  the  pro- 
tective duties  on  wools  and  woolens,  which  stood 
unchanged  until  1883,  were  adopted.  In  1870  we  had 
28,477,951  sheep,  in  1880,  40,190,866.  During  these  ten 
protective  years  a  gain  of  43  per  cent,  in  sheep  hus- 
bandry against  a  gain  of  a  little  over  3  per  cent,  from 
1850  to  1860,  and  all  this  wool  was  bought  by  our  own 
mills. 

In  1860  these  mills  used  125,000,000  pounds,  domestic 
and  imported,  200,000,000  pounds  in  1870,  and  300,- 
000,000  pounds,  in  round  numbers,  in  1880, — a  healthy 
increase.  In  1880  they  bought  of  our  wool  growers, 
principally  in  the  west  and  southwest,  1100,000,000 
worth,  a  single  large  factory  using  thirty  thousand 
pounds,  or  six  thousand  fleeces,  each  day.  Break  down 
our  668  woolen  mills  in  the  Western  States,  and  the  794 
mills  in  the  east,  and  the  wool  grower's  market  in  Lon- 
don would  be  a  poor  one. 

The  wool  gi-owing  interest  in  this  country  would  suf- 
fer serious  injury  by  any  decrease  in  our  home  manu- 
facture of  woolens,  as  their  clip  increases  each  year 
and  wants  a  growing  home  market  from  the  manufact- 


68  Tlie  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

iirers.  These  maiiul'acturers  would  be  equally  injured 
by  any  decrease  in  the  liome  supply  of  wool.  Their 
interest  is  really  one. 

But  are  woolen  goods  higher,  or  lower,  than  in  the 
low-tari±f  year  1860  ?     The  following  table  will  show: 

Goods.  I860.  ia'^2. 

Fitchburgh  cassimercs,  per  yard. . .  .95    cents      .85    cents 

Haile,  Frost  &  Co. ,  caslunerets 46       "  .38^ 

Men's  ribbed  socks,  per  doz 8.00       "  4.50 

Ladies'  ribbed  hose,       •'       4.25       "  3.00 

Blankets,    9-4  Gonic 1.87^     "  1.75 

10-4      •'     2.37i     "  3.25 

11-4      "     3.00       •'  2.75 

12-4  XX  Rochdale 8.00       "  9.00 

Moscow  beavers,  all-wool 4. 00       "  3. 00 

"        cotton-warp 1.35       "  1.00 

"hoxorable"  ignorance. 

Mr.  Titus  Sheard,  an  Englishman  by  birth,  now  a. 
woolen  manufacturer,  writes  the  following  letter,  criticis- 
ing a  gross  misstatement  : 

To  the  Editor  of  the  Commercial  Bulletin : 

In  Macmillans  Magazine  for  February  I  find  an  article  entitled 
"The  Industries  of  the  United  States  in  Relation  to  the  Tariff," 
by  the  Right  Hon.  Lyon  Playfair,  M.  P. 

Among  the  many  curious  statements  I  find  the  following,  which 
is  used  to  show  how  the  poor  man  is  ground  down  under  our  pro- 
tective tariff : 

"  A  workingman  buying  an  ulster  coat  for  the  winter  at  Boston  must  pay 
doiible  the  price  that  an  Englisli  workman  does  ;  that  is,  in  Boston  it  costs 
eight  pounds,  and  in  England  less  than  four. 

"  A  workingman's  woolen  trousers  in  Boston  cost  seven  shillings  ;  a  like 
pair  in  Manchester  can  be  got  for  four." 

Now,  sir,  is  not  this  statement  untrue  ;  and  an  outrage  upon 
the  intelligent  reader  V 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  oQ" 

I  do  not  know  at  what  price  you  can  get  a  pair  of  woolen  trous- 
ers in  Boston,  but  if  you  can  get  them  for  "seven  shillings"  you 
can  get  them  in  Boston  as  cheap  as  in  Manchester,  quality  con- 
sidered. 

As  to  the  ulster  coat,  we  can  buy  them,  all  wool  (not  cotton 
warp),  at  |10  in  our  village — about  two  pounds,  not  "eight 
pounds;"  so  that  thej- must  cost  much  "less  than  four"  pounds 
in  England  before  they  can  buy  as  cheap  there  as  here. 

While  1  am  writing,  one  of  our  workingmen,  an  Englishman^ 
who  has  been  in  this  country  a  little  over  one  year,  enters  my 
olhce. 

I  read  the  above  extract  to  him,  and  asked  him  how  it  is  about 
the  prices  given  and  compared. 

"  Qualit}'  considered,  I  can  buy  as  cheap  here  as  I  can  at  home 
in  Yorkshire." 

I  asked  him  about  the  all-wool  ulster  coat  which  he  had  on,  and 
how  much  it  cost. 

He  answered,  "ten  dollars,  and  it  aren't  cotton  warp,  either." 

"Is  the  suit  of  clothes  you  have  on  all  wool '?"  "  Yes,  sir  !" 
"  What  did  they  cost  ?"  "Ten  dollars."  "What  did  those  new 
shoes  you  have  on  cost?"  "Two  dollars  and  a-lialf."  "Could 
you  buy  those  clothes  any  cheaper  at  home?"     "  No,  sir!" 

"  How  about  the  shoes?"  "  They  would  cost  me  at  home  threo 
dollars  and  a-half."  "  How  about  your  stockings  and  shirt  and 
underclothes?"     "I  can  buy  them  as  cheap  here  as  at  home!" 

• '  AVhat  is  there  then  here  that  costs  you  more  than  it  would  '  at 
home '  for  yourself  or  the  support  of  your  family?"  "Nothing 
but  house-rent  and  coals.  Everything  else  is  as  cheap  and  in 
man}'  cases  cheaper.  On  the  whole  I  can  take  better  care  of  my 
family  here,  feed  and  clothe  them  better,  and  live  more  comfort- 
ably at  the  same  cost  than  I  can  at  home  in  England." 

Nail  this  statement  of  facts  to  the  mast  of  protection,  as  an 
answer  to  all  the  Right  Hon.  gentlemen,  M.  P.'s  or  otherwise, 
who  choose  to  so  misstate  and  misrepresent  our  industrial  condi- 
tion and  deceive  the  workingmen  of  our  own  and  other  lands 

Yours  most  respectfully, 

TiTUS  Sheakd, 

Little  Falls,  N.  Y.,  April  4,  1882. 


60  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted 


STAPLE    CLOTHS    CHEAP. 

V.  B,  Denslow,  of  Chicago,  says  : 

"I  am  informed  by  Mr.  Marshall  Field,  the  leading  dry  goods 
merchant  in  Chicago,  *  *  that  the  prices  at  which  ordinary 
cheap  cottons  and  woolens  sell  in  the  United  States  are  lower  than 
in  England.  But  in  fine  and  costly  goods  we  cannot  compete  with 
her  in  the  markets  of  the  world  until  we  have  her  cheap  labor,  in 
some  departments  one-fourth  the  cost  of  ours,  and  we  cannot  have 
that  cheap  labor  so  long  as  we  continue  our  protective  tariff." 

Hon.  M.  Haskill,  M.  C,  of  Kansas,  in  the  tariff 
debate  last  winter  in  Washington,  said  : 

"Then  there  is  the  article  of  woolen  cassimere  cloth.  Take 
this  great  leading  schedule  or  classification  of  woolen  goods.  Go 
back  to  your  old  compai-ative  free-trade  era  from  1850  and  1860, 
when  wool  was  free  and  the  duty  on  cloth  nominal.  Take  the 
case  of  the  Hale  &  Frost  factory,  of  Fitchburgh,  Massachusetts, 
an  old  firm  that  was  established  in  1848,  using  the  same  old  looms 
that  were  u  ed  from  1850  to  1S60,  hardly  a  new  invention  in  their 
mills,  the  same  old  firm  managing  the  business.  Here  are  the 
Hale  &  Fro:  t  cashmerets,  light  wool  spring  goods,  cotton  warp, 
for  men  and  I^oys  ;  with  free  wool  and  revenue  tariff  the  prices  of 
these  goods  from  1850  to  1860  averaged  51  cents  per  yard.  Aver- 
age price  for  the  identical  goods,  made  on  same  looms  by  same 
2irocess  in  1882,  45  cents  per  yard. 

"Drawn  from  their  books,  1  have  a  statement  showing  that  from 
1850  to  1860  they  sold  their  cassimeres  at  an  average  price  of  $1.07 
a  yard.  Then  came  the  tariff  rate  under  the  law  of  1861  ;  and 
the  duty,  you  say,  is  always  added  to  the  price.  From  1870  to 
1880,  when  we  reached  resumption,  tlie  Hale  &  Frost  cassimeres 
avei-aged  in  price  from  their  mill  97  cents  a  yard  instead  of  $1.07. 

"  Take  the  very  item  of  wool,  in  which  you  are  all  interested. 
From  1850  to  1860  wool  was  free,  and  the  wool  interests  of  this 
country  were  at  a  low  ebb.  The  market  for  wool  was  in  the 
hands  of  the  importer  ;  it  was  in  the  hands  of  the  foreign  grower. 
To-day,  mider  our  tariff  system,  the  market  for  American  wool  is 
in  the  hands  of  the  American  grower.      Every  pound  of  wool 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  61 

that  the  American  farmer  can  raise  he  sells  to-day  to  an  American 
manufacturer,  and  the  money  stays  at  home — is  not  sent  abroad. 
Do  you  say  that  the  price  of  wool  has  increased  under  this  tariff 
of  12  cents  a  pound  as  against  the  free  wool  of  1850  to  1860  ?  I 
have  here  the  figures.  To-day  wool  is  cheaper  pound  for  pound, 
and  has  been  for  the  last  five  years,  than  it  was  from  1855  to  1860 
under  the  free  rating  of  the  free  trade  party. " 

Mr.  Springer.     "Then  what  do  you  want  a  duty  for  ? 

Mr.  Haskell.  "Because,  while  the  price  of  wool  has  fallen, 
the  American  grower  holds  the  market  and  gets  every  dollar  that 
the  American  wool  manufacturer  pays  out  for  his  material,  except 
as  to  two  items — clothing  wool,  a  small  importation,  and  carpet 
wools.  I  want  the  money  paid  by  the  manufacturer  for  wools  to 
be  paid  in  the  United  States,  not  in  Australia,  Africa,  or  Persia." 

The  Chicago  Morning  Herald  tells  of  an  Indiana 
woolen  mill,  the  owner  of  which  said,  "from  his 
books,"  that  jeans  which  he  sold  at  60  cents  per  yard  in 
1860,  brought  him  but  50  cents  in  1874,  while  he  paid 
higher  wages  at  the  last  date  than  the  first — price  lower 
under  a  higher  duty. 

Mr.  Archibald,  English  Constil  Greneral  in  New  York, 
reported  to  his  government :  "The  prices  of  carjDets  in 
the  United  States  are  13  per  cent,  cheaper  in  1879  than 
in  1860,  while  prices  of  dress  goods  have  fallen  about  25 
per  cent."  This  fact  of  falling  prices  under  a  higher 
tariff  was  thought  of  consequence  enough  to  find  j^lace 
in  a  Parliamentary  Report. 

BRITISH    FACTORY    LIFE. 

From  Dewsbury,  Yorkshire,  England,  Mr.  Porter 
writes  the  Neiv  York  Tribune: 

"This  is  the  centre  of  the  woolen  district  in  England.  A  circle 
of  forty-five  miles  in  diameter  contains  the  greatest  woolen  and 
worsted  regions  in  England.  I  might  say  of  the  world.  Shoddy 
blankets,  shoddy  army  cloths,  and  plushings  and  seal-skins  are 


62  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  liefuted. 

Inade  here.  The  woolen  factories  are  large  gray  stone  buildings, 
walled  in  like  prisons,  with  vigilant  porters  stationed  at  all  the 
entrances  lest  strangers  should  accidentally  get  into  the  factories 
and  appropriate  the  new  designs  or  otherwise  find  out  something 
of  their  internal  economy.  The  manufacturers  seem  about  as 
hard  and  sharp  as  the  machines  which  weave  their  mungo  and 
shoddy  into  cloth.  The  hands  are  ground  down  to  the  lowest 
penny,  and  a  recent  strike  among  the  operatives  brought  out  the 
fact  that  the  average  earnings  of  all  hands,  including  the  high- 
priced  overseers  and  foremen  was  only  sixteen  shillings,  or  $4  a 
week  at  Dewsbury  and  Batley.  The  rent  of  one  or  two  rooms  in 
the  poorest  locality  of  the  town,  is  £7  a  year. 

"These  immense  factories  straggle  along  on  the  outskirts  of 
Dewsbury  for  many  miles." 

The  London  Standard  tells  of.  16,000  women  and  girls 
in  "the  Black  Country"  making  nails,  and  ''three  or 
four  persons  working  fourteen  hours  a  day,"  and  earn- 
ing, in  all,  five  dollars  a  tveeh,  living  in  wretched  hovels, 
and  the  freshness  of  youth  all  crushed  out." 

Fortunately,  British  workers  in  some  branches  are 
better  paid,  and  live  better ;  but  the  average  standard  of 
life  is  far  lower  than  here. 

BRITISH    SHODDY. 

Honest  excellence  must  be  counted.  The  British 
common  woolens  and  carpets  have  a  great  deal  more 
slioddy  in  their  fabrics  than  ours.  Many  of  our  mills 
use  none.  In  a  late  S]3eech  in  Congress  Hon.  W.  D. 
Kelley  said  : 

"What  are  shoddy  and  mungo?  Why,  sir,  there  is  not  a  c?df- 
fonnier  with  stick  and  nail  and  bag  scouring  the  gutters  of  any 
city  on  either  side  of  the  Atlantic  for  woolen  rags  who  is  not  col- 
lecting material  for  the  m.umfacture  of  shoddy  and  mungo.  The 
cast-off  clothing  and  the  l)lankets  which  have  wrapped  putrefying 
carcasses  in  the  la/.ar  and  pest-houses  of  Europe  and  Asia,  are 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  63 

gathered  and  thrown  into  running  streams  whose  waters  are 
dammed  at  intervals,  and  when  the  law  of  gravitation  and  the 
flow  of  waters  have  made  it  safe  to  handle  them  they  are  col- 
lected and  sent  to  Lancashire  to  be  converted  into  shoddy  cloths, 
flannels,  blankets,  and  carpets.         ****** 

"British  carpets,  we  have  been  told,  are  much  cheaper  than  ours. 
1  hope  the  gentleman  who  represents  the  Macon  (Georgia)  district 
is  on  the  floor.  I  want  to  mention  a  few  facts  which  he  can  prob- 
ably verif}'.  The  Bibb  Manufacturing  Company  of  ]\Iacon  rung 
11,000  spindles  in  the  production  of  carpet-j^arn.  Mr.  Hanson, 
the  superintendent  of  the  mill,  sells  all  he  can  now  produce 
to  the  carpet  makers  of  Philadelphia,  New  York  and  New  Eng- 
land. The  capacity  of  the  mill  is  to  be  greatly  increased  in  order 
to  meet  the  gi'owing  home  -^.emand  for  its  yarn. 

"But,  impelled  by  fear  that  the  duties  on  carpets  would  be 
reduced  and  his  home  market  be  thus  destroyed,  he  addressed  the 
most  distinguished  carpet  manufacturer  of  England,  sent  him 
samples  of  his  j^arns,  with  price-list  or  tag  attached  to  each  parcel. 
His  letter  was  courteously  responded  to,  and  with  the  answer 
came  specimens  of  the  yarns  used  by  that  distinguished  carpet 
manuf  acturer]in  his  immense  works  at  Rochdale.  The  best  of  them 
did  not  equal  the  most  inferior  product  of  the  Bibb  Company,  and 
John  Bright  stated  candidly  that  such  yarns  as  these  could  not 
be  used  by  British  carpet-makers,  as  they  had  to  sell  in  countries 
in  which  low  prices  prevailed,  and  must  consequently  use  the 
cheapest  materials.  No  fresh  cotton,  said  Mr.  Hanson,  could  be 
found  in  any  of  those  English  carpet-yarns,  and  the  lower  grades 
were  literally  made  of  what  might  be  called  cotton  shoddy,  the 
waste  of  ordinary  cotton  mills." 

THE    POOR   FARMER   AND    HIS   BLANKET.S. 

In  a  speech  in  the  West  a  few  months  ago  Professor 
Percy  spoke  of  tlie  Iowa  farmer  who  coitkl  Iniy  two  pair 
of  blankets  in  Enghxnd  for  wliat  one  pair  wonkl  cost 
"in  this  privileged  land,"  the  tariff  doubling  the  i)rice  to 
that  poor  farmer.  This  was  assertion.  Here  is  plain 
fact.     The  Boston  Commercial  Bidletin  says  : 


6-4  Tlie  Free  Trade  Fulsehood  Refuted. 

"  In  order  to  determine  the  comparative  prices  of  blankets  in 
England  and  America,  a  pair  of  5-lb.  blankets  was  recently 
imported  by  a  New  England  manufacturer  at  the  lowest  possible 
cost,  the  statement  of  their  cost,  duty-paid,  was  as  follows  : 

"  Cost  of  1  pair  of  blankets  received  per  steamship  Batavia: 

Cost  at  wholesale  in  England  18s.  Id.,  equal  to |4.45 

Weight  duty,  5  pounds  at  50c $2.50 

Ad  valorem  do.  35  per  cent 1.75 

4.25 

Custom  house  fees , 65 

Total $9.35 

"  Now,  if  it  were  true  that  the  American  price  of  an  article  is  the 
English  price  plus  the  duties,  such  blankets  ought  to  be  selling^ 
here  at  $9.35  per  pair;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  American  blankets 
of  precisely  the  same  weight  and  quality  are  selling  at  $5.20  per 
pair,  or  but  75  cents  higher  than  in  England." 

FLANNELS,    ETC. 

Fliinnels  were  high  in  1880-2,  but  ten  per  cent,  lower 
in  18T8  thiin  in  1860.  Staple  woolens  for  common  work- 
ing wear  are  cheaper.  In  the  streets  of  Windsor,  oppo- 
site Detroit,  on  the  Canadian  side  of  the  river,  arc  the 
handbills  of  our  clothing  merchants  asking  custom,  and 
getting  it,  too.  Our  neighbors  over  the  line  are  not 
stujnd  enough  to  come  to  us  and  pay  higher  for  clothing 
than  at  home.  This  fact  might  be  beneficial  to  the 
loioa  State  Leader,  which  has  been  led  by  some  of  the 
notoriously  loose  assertions  of  D.  A.  Wells  to  say  that 
the  tariff  has  made  woolens  "outrageously  dear  to  the 
consumer."  A  few  days  ago  otir  daily  papers  reported 
the  case  of  a  Canadian  woman  caught  in  tlie  effort  to 
smuggle  a  pair  of  boots,  bought  here,  for  her  own  use. 
She  forgot  that  they  were  taxed  35  per  cent,  by  otir 
"iniquitous  tariff." 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  65 

Mr.  E.  P.  Brooks,  U.  S.  Consul  at  Cork,  Ireland, 
reports  to  the  State  Department  at  Washington,  in 
August,  1881  :  "Cheaj)  clothing  in  the  United  States  is 
cheaper  than  here.  *  *  *  Ireland  has  had  free  trade 
with  England  eighty  years,  during  which  time  her  woolen 
mills  have  been  almost  destroyed,  yet  her  people  buy 
their  cheap  clothing  dearer  than  we  pay." 

The  woolen  manufacture  of  this  country — cloths,  car- 
pets, worsted,  and  hosiery — in  1880  paid  $45,959,000 
wages  ;  produced  $234,589,671  worth  ;  and  used  total 
raw  material  worth  $145,141,000;  (speech  of  Dr.  C  B. 
Loring)  increasing  its  products  over  $200,000,000  since 
1840.  Fear  of  this  increase  sends  the  poor  cry  across  the 
ocean  :  "A  tariff  is  a  tax!"  More  than  four-fifths  of 
our  woolen  goods  are  made  here,  and  the  50,000,000  con- 
sumers buy  their  working  wear  as  cheap  as  in  England, 
and  are  far  more  able  to  pay  for  it  than  the  people  there. 

IRON"   AND   STEEL. 

Mr.  John  Roach  says  that  the  average  price  in  New 
York  of  ship-plates,  flange  iron,  angle  iron  and  rivets, 
which  he  buys  largely,  was  25  per  cent,  lower,  from  1870 
to  1880,  than  from  1850  to  1860  under  a  lower  tariff, 
and  that  wages  were  20  per  cent  higher. 

The  London  Engineer,  devoted  to  British  manufact- 
ures, says  ;  "As  far  as  the  American  consumer  of  iron 
is  concerned  he  is  the  better  off  for  protection."  How 
can  that  protection  tax  the  consumer? 

Cast  steel  of  English  make  had  been  sold  here  for 
twenty  years,  at  16  cents  to  18  cents  per  pound,  and 
none  was  made  here.  Under  a  higher  tariff  our  steel 
makers  began  work  about  1862,  on  a  large  scale,  at  Pitts- 
burg and  elsewhere,  and  the  same  quality  came  down  to 


66  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

13  cents  and  15  cents.  In  the  late  civil  war  our  cast 
steel  was  sold  at  32  cents  while  British  steel  was  held  at 
45  cents,  thus  saving  our  Government  large  sums  in  its 
war  consumjation,  and  saving  us  from  dependence  on  a 
foreign  power,  always  dangerous  in  such  emergencies. 

In  a  Congressional  speech  in  April,  1881,  Hon.  Rus- 
sell Errett,  of  Pittsburgh,  stated  that  the  English  price 
of  cast  steel  in  New  York,  when  they  controlled  our 
market  and  none  was  made  here,  was  17^  cents  i)er 
pound.  That  steel  they  now  sell  in  Paris  and  otluu* 
European  markets  for  12 1- cents,  but  in  New  York  they 
sell  it  at  \^\  cents,  making  their  price  two  cents  lower 
in  this  country  than  in  Europe,  to  break  down  our  com- 
petition, or  at  least  command  a  share  of  our  market. 
His  statement  is  confirmed  by  others.  Plainly  enough 
our  home  manufacture  has  largely  reduced  tlic  price  of 
steel,  yet  we  are  glibly  told  of  "a  tax  of  60  per  cent,  on 
the  consumers,  imposed  by  our  tariff  !" 

Mr.  James  Park,  Jr.,  of  the  Black  Diamond  Steel 
Works,  Pittsburgh,  Pa.,  stated  before  the  Congressional 
Naval  Committee,  in  February,  that  extensive  corres- 
pondence and  inquiry  led  him  to  estimate  the  saving 
to  users  of  cast  steel  in  this  country  by  the  growth 
of  our  steel-making  under  a  protective  tariff,  and  the 
consequent  reduction  of  price,  at  over  $23,000,000,  or 
38  per  cent.  He  said  we  paid  higher  wages  than  are 
paid  abroad,  and  tliat  no  steel  was  sujierior  to  oui-s.  Mr. 
Park  is  a  man  of  large  experience,  and  has  visited  all 
the  great  steel  works  of  Europe. 

STEEL   HAILS. 

Bessemer  steel  rails  were  first  made  ni  this  country  in 
1867.  but  not  largely  until  1870.     U^p  to  the  date  of  the 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  67 

opening  of  the  first  steel  rail  mill  here  the  English  con- 
trolled onr  market  and  prices,  charging  us  $150  in  gold 
per  ton.  The  moment  tlie  first  rails  were  made  here 
they  were  compelled  to  reduce  their  prices,  and  brought 
them  down  in  1870  to  $50.37  gold  in  England,  equal  to 
$57.93  in  our  currency.  At  that  price  they  could  be 
sent  to  New  York  and  freight  paid  at  a  cost  of  $G3  per 
ton,  ^N\\\\  no  duty.  Since  then  our  American  mills  have 
furnished  our  railroads  with  over  3,000,000  tons,  at  an 
average  cost  of  $59  per  ton  in  currency,  their  prices 
going  down  from  $10G  in  1870  to  $40  in  the  panic  times 
of  1878,  up  to  $85  in  ''the  boom"  of  1880,  and  now 
stand  at  $39  to  $-10.  This  great  business  employs  over 
20,000  American  workmen,  pays  over  $7,500,000  yearly 
in  wages,  and  has  furnished  us  steel  rails  for  ten  vears 
at  an  average  price  a  little  less  than  the  Englisli  price 
in  1870. 

In  tlie  Western  States  $15,000,000  is  invested  in  steel 
rail  mills  ;  their  yearly  product  of  nearly  $20,000,000  is 
almost  wholly  raw  material,  labor  and  skill  in  our  midst. 

In  the  winter  of  1879-80  officers  of  15,300  miles  of 
railroads  asked  Congress  for  a  reduction  of  the  duties  to 
$10  per  ton ;  but  officers  of  24,000  miles  of  railroads, 
with  larger  traffic  (among  them  6,000  miles  going  out 
from  Chicago),  asked  the  retention  of  that  duty,  on  the 
ground  that  such  a  great  reduction  would  be  disastrous 
to  them  and  to  the  makers  of  rails. 

The  English,  thirty  years  ago,  sold  us  inmieiise  quan- 
tities of  "American  rails" — so  poor  and  brittle  that 
that  they  could  not  be  sold  at  home — at  $50  per  ton.  In 
place  of  tlicse  we  now  liave  those  of  steel,  safer  and  ten- 
fold more  durable,  at  $40.  Here  is  a  reminiscence  of 
those  days : 


68  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

Brooklyn,  N.  Y.,  February  15,  1882. 
To  the  Secretm^y  of  the  American  Iron  and  Steel  Association. 

Sir  :  About  the  year  1850  the  writer  was  a  clerk  in  a 
house  in  Boston,  which  represented  one  of  the  largest  of 
the  English  iron  rolling  mills.  It  was  a  period  of  low 
duties  on  railroad  iron.  The  United  States  vail  market 
was  supplied  partly  from  England  and  partly  from  Amer- 
ican mills.  The  prices  of  rails  were  very  low,  and  the 
English  houses  persisted  in  constantly  depressing  them, 
until,  as  this  squeezing  process  went  on,  the  American 
mills  gradually  shut  down,  and  finally  the  last  American 
mill  was  closed. 

When  the  news  from  our  house  went  across  to  England! 
that  there  was  no  longer  any  danger  from  American 
competition,  the  reply  immediately  came  back,  "advance 
prices."  This  process  of  advancing  prices  then  went 
on,  until  within  less  than  a  year  prices  to  the  American 
consumers  had  gone  up  nearly  or  quite  100  per  cent., 
far  beyond  the  price  at  which  the  home  industries  would 
gladly  have  supplied  the  demand  had  they  been  at  work. 
Yours  Truly, 

An   AMERICAlf. 

liAILS,   SAWS   AISTD    AXES. 

The  manufacture  of  cut  nails  is  an  American  inven- 
tion, originating  near  tlie  beginning  of  the  present  cen- 
tury. When  it  was  first  undertaken  in  this  country, 
wrought  nails,  which  then  cost  25  cents  a  pound,  were 
largely  imported;  hence  the  necessity  for  protection  to 
the  new  industry.  By  the  tariff  act  of  1824  the  duty 
on  all  nails  was  made  5  cents  per  pound,  at  which  it 
remained  until   1833,    since   which  year  it    has    been 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  69 

reduced.  Prices  of  cut  nails  have  ranged  as  follows 
during  the  past  fifty  years:  In  1828  the  price  was  7  to 
8  cents  per  pound  ;  in  1830  5  and  6  cents;  from  1835 
to  1840  from  5  to  7  cents,  falling  in  1840  to  5  and  6 
■cents;  in  1844  and  1846  it  was  4  and  5  cents;  in  1861  it 
was  3  cents.  Like  all  other  products,  the  price  advanced 
during  the  war,  but  before  the  panic  of  1873  it  had  again 
fallen  to  3  cents,  and  on  the  1st  of  January,  1876,  the 
price  was  2|  cents.  It  will  be  noted  that,  in  1830,  six- 
years  after  the  duty  was  made  5  cents  per  pound,  the 
price  was  the  same  as  the  duty;  that,  in  1833  the  price 
fell  below  the  duty;  that,  in  1842,  it  was  2  cents  per 
pound  below  the  duty;  and  that,  on  the  1st  of  January, 
1876,  it  was  just  one-half  the  duty  of  1824,  and  about 
•one-fourth  the  price  charged  for  cut  nails  when  that 
duty  was  imposed.  For  a  long  time  we  have  exported 
nails  to  foreign  countries,  the  value  of  the  exports  of 
nails  and  spikes  in  the  fiscal  year  1875  amounting  to 
half  a  million  of  dollars. 

Prior  to  the  revolution,  and  for  many  years  after  its 
■close,  our  saws  came  from  abroad,  and  we  paid  for  them 
just  what  foreigners  were  pleased  to  charge  us.  In  1840 
an  American  mechanic,  Henry  Disston,  commenced  the 
manufacture  on  a  small  scale.  At  that  time  English 
saws  sold  in  our  markets  at  from  $15.75  to  $19  a  dozen. 
Mr,  Disston  was  obliged  to  sell  his  saws  for  less  money, 
as  his  goods  were  unknown;  but  after  the  Disston  saw 
became  known  the  English  saws  were  gradually  driven 
■out  of  our  markets  and  prices  still  further  reduced.  In 
1876  Henry  Disston  &  Sons  were  sending  saws  to 
England  and  selling  them  at  $10.50  a  dozen,  fully  fifty 
per  cent,  less  than  the  price  Englishmen  charged  us  in 
1840.     When  Mr.  Disston  commenced  business,  inferior 


70  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

saws  of  foreign  manufacture  were  sold  in  this  country  at 
$4.50  a  dozen,  and  he  couhl  not  make  saws  for  less  than 
17  a  dozen,  but  now  Henry  Disston  &  Sons  ship  common 
saws  to  South  America  at  14.50.  The  exports  of  their 
goods  in  1875  amounted  to  fully  1100,000.  The  Messrs. 
Disston  make  their  own  steel. 

Before  axes  were  made  in  this  country,  except  by 
country  blacksmiths,  English  axes  cost  our  farmers 
and  others  from  12  to  14  each.  By  the  tariff  of  1828 
a  protective  duty  of  35  per  cent,  was  levied  upon  im- 
ported axes.  Under  tliis  protection  the  Collins  Com- 
pany, of  llartforti,  introduced  labor-saving  machinery, 
much  of  which  was  invented,  patented,  and  constructed 
by  themselves.  In  1836  foreign  and  home-made  axes 
were  selling  side  by  side,  in  the  American  market,  at 
$15  to  $10  per  dozen.  Axes  were  selling,  in  1838,  at 
$13  to  $15.25  per  dozen;  in  1843,  at  $11  to  $12;  in  1849, 
at  $8  to  $10.  In  1876  the  price  of  the  best  American 
axes  in  the  market  is  $9.50  per  dozen  in  currency,  and 
the  country  exports  to  foreign  markets.  English  writers, 
admit  their  superior  excellence.  The  Collins  company 
makes  its  own  steel,  and  a  letter  from  the  company 
claims  that  it  is  "  better  than  any  English  steel  we  can. 
buy,  and  we  have  been  steel  consumers  for  fifty  years. 
We  now  only  make  for  our  own  consumption,  and  we- 
have  no  disposition  to  cheat  ourselves." — Amsrican  Iron 
Trade. 

CUTLERY. 

In  1842,  President  Wayland  of  Brown  University, 
Providence,  E.  I.,  said   (Political  Economy,  page  140)  : 

"We  pay  a  heavj'  duty  on  cutlery  in  tlii^^  country,  while  not  a 
thousandtli  part  of  the  cutlery  used  is  made  here.     It  would  be 


The  Free  Trdde  Falsehood  Refuted.  71 

vastly  cheaper  to  pay  a  bounty  sufScient  to  raise  all  the  cutlery 
made  in  this  country  to  its  present  prices,  and  it  would  be,  for 
aught  I  see,  just  as  good  for  the  cutler." 

He  was  an  estimable  g'entleman,  but  like  some  otlier 
college  professors,  was  a  theorist  ignorant  of  the  facts  of 
industrial  life. 

If  the  American  people  had  listened  to  him  they  would 
not  have  the  cheap  and  abundant  supply  of  hardware 
and  cutlery  that  they  enjoy  at  this  time.  Forty  years 
ago  American  hardware  was  almost  unknown  in  the 
trade,  yet  five-sixths  of  the  consumption  is  now  supplied 
by  home  industry,  and  our  exported  cutlery  is  on  the 
shelves  of  dealers  in  Sheffield  and  Birmingham. 

In  1842,  Wayland  thought  it  ridiculous  to  protect  the 
American  manufacturers  of  these  goods,  but  the  "high 
duty"  produced  results  which  he  could  not  foresee. 
Wliat  they  are  let  an  English  journal  toll. 

Eyland's  Iro)i  Trade  Cirmdar,  for  March  4,  1871,  at 
Birmingham,  England,  says  : 

"  The  edged-tool  trade  is  well  sustained,  and  we  have  less  of  the 
effects  of  American  competition.  That  this  competition  is  severe, 
however,  is  a  fact  that  cannot  be  ignored.  The  ascendance  of  the 
protectionist  party  in  the  States  continues  to  operate  most  favor- 
ably for  the  manufacturing  interest  there,  and  it  is  no  wonder 
that,  under  such  benignant  auspices,  the  enterprise  in  this  direc- 
tion is  swelling  to  colossal  proportions." 

In  a  si^eech  in  the  United  States  Senate,  February  27, 
1832,  Greorge  M.  Dallas,  who  became  Vice-President 
under  James  K.  Polk,  gave  his  personal  knowledge 
regarding  the  effects  of  the  protective  tariffs  of  1824  and 
1828  in  chea])ening  the  prices  of  vju'ious  articles  manu- 
factured from  iron  or  steel  : 

"  The  reduction  of  the  prices  was  a  necessary  consequence  of 
lh(!   domestic   competition   created   and   excited   by    tlie    policy. 


72  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

Since  1818,  1819,  and  1820  the  implements  of  husbandly  have 
sunk  in  price  thus:  Axes,  from  $24  to  $12  by  the  dozen;  scythes, 
spades,  and  common  shovels,  50  per  cent.  Iron  hoes,  at  $9  by  the 
dozen,  have  given  way  to  steel  ones  at  $4.  Socket  shovels,  once 
sold  at  $12  a  dozen,  now  sell  at  $4.50;  iron  vises,  once  at  20  cents 
by  the  pound,  now  at  10  cents;  braziers'  rods  were,  in  1821,  im- 
ported at  $313  by  the  ton,  and  now  are  made  at  $130;  and  steam- 
engines  have  actually,  since  1828,  fallen  50  per  cent,  in  price, 
while  at  the  same  time  the  amount  of  material  and  labor  of  which 
they  are  composed  has  nearly  doubled." 

Facts  like  these  are  worth  tons  of  theories  concocted 
by  scholars  who  get  all  their  knowledge  from  books, 
rather  than  go  out  into  the  actual  world. 

Let  all  the  schoolboys  cypher  out  how  a  tariff  is  a  tax 
on  nails,  saws,  axes,  and  cutlery.  It  will  be  a  tough  job; 
perhaps  they  will  have  to  take  their  slates  home  from 
school  and  get  their  fathers  to  help  them;  and  perhaps 
the  fathers  will  give  it  up. 

SALT. 

Deluded  dairymen  resolve  that  the  salt  monopoly  must 
be  destroyed,  and  the  fearful  salt  tax  in  the  shape  of  a 
tariff,  under  which  they  suffer,  must  be  abolished.  An 
Illinois  dairyman  said  in  a  convention  that  three- 
fourths  of  an  ounce  of  salt  to  a  pound  of  butter  was 
enough.  Call  it  six  pounds  of  salt  to  one  hundred 
pounds  of  butter,  suppose  the  tariff  of  13  cents  on  100 
pounds  of  imported  salt  is  a  tax,  and  when  the  groaning 
dairyman  sells  his  nice  firkin  of  a  liundred  pounds  of 
butter,  and  pockets  his  $20  or  more,  he  has  paid  a  tax 
of  three-fourths  of  a  cent!  But  he  has  sold  his  salt, 
which  cost  him  say  6  cents,  for  over  $1.20,  and  still  he 
groans  about  the  tax!  The  revenue  of  a  million  dollars 
or  more  which  the  salt  tariff'  yields  to  the  government 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  73 

■eyen  if  the  whole  duty  is  added  to  the  price,  would  aver- 
age about  five  cents  per  head  of  our  total  population.  A 
fearful  tax! 

But  its  price  in  Chicago,  where  the  west  gets  its 
largest  supply,  is  about  a  dollar  a  barrel  (280  pounds,  or 
five  bushels,  barrel  included)  or  half  the  cost  in  1860. 

Here  are  the  prices  at  Saginaw,  where  3,000,000  bar- 
rels a  year  are  made  : 

Average  price  per  bai'rel,  1866 f  1  80 

"      1868 1  85 

"      1870 1  33 

«  "      1872 1  46 

«  "      1874 1  19 

««  "      1876 1  05 

«  «•      1878 85 

««  "      1880 75 

"  "      1883 74 

PLATE    GLASS. 

At  St.  Louis,  Mr.  E.  A.  Hitchcock  stated  to  the 
Tariff  Commission  that  the  yearly  production  of  Ameri- 
can plate  glass  was  about  two  million  square  feet,  or  half 
the  consumption ;  that  labor  represented  near  three- 
fourths  of  its  cost ;  that  the  average  duty  for  fifteen 
years  had  been  about  fifty  per  cent. ;  and  that  the  cost 
had  been  reduced  in  ten  years  from  $2.50  to  $1.00  per 
squarejoot. 

LUMBER. 

The  Iowa  farmer  groans  over  the  moaerate  duty  of  15 
to  20  per  cent,  on  lumber,  as  adding  $3  per  thousand 
feet  to  the  price  he  pays.  Had  he  studied  the  Chicago 
prices  current  he  would  know  that  for  the  three  years 
from  1863  to  1865,  with  Canada  lumber  free,  the  average 


74  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

yearly  prices  were  not  anij  lower  than  in  the  three  years 
from  1<SG7  to  38G9,  when  the  dnty  was  20  per  cent. 
Some  times  this  might  be  different,  but  this  shows  that 
the  duty  was  not  added  to  the  price  of  the  thousands  of 
millions  of  feet  of  lumber  sent  over  the  West  in  those 
years.  It  may  be  asked,  Why  then  do  our  lumber  man- 
ufacturers want  a  duty  on  imported  lumber  ?  Not  that 
it  so  mucli  affects  the  price,  as  they  furnish  the  larger 
part,  l)ut  that  the  duty  lessens  the  imports,  gives  tliera  a 
wider  market,  helps  to  give  employment  to  200,000 
workmen,  at  wages  25  per  cent,  higher  than  in  Canada, 
and  to  keep  up  a  homo  market  for  $30,000,000  of  tlie 
products  of  our  farms  and  $20,000,000  of  home  manu- 
factures which  they  consume  each  year. 

A    FRENCH   STATEMENT. 

In  1878  a  French  Senatorial  Commission  to  examine 
their  trade  and  its  relations  to  other  nations,  said,  in 
their  report:  "A  veritable  economical  revolution  has 
taken  place  in  the  United  States.  Under  the  shelter  of 
a  prohil)ition  system  *  *  they  have  organized  a  pow- 
erful industry  which  rivals  England  in  cheapness."  We 
*' rival  England  in  ehea])ness,''  the  impartial  foreigners 
say ;  yet  free  traders  here  pretend  that  our  tariff  adds 
30  to  60  per  cent,  to  our  prices  ! 

BOOTS   AND    SHOES. 

Would  the  Ijuyers  of  boots  and  shoes  be  helped  if 
143,000,000  of  yearly  wages  were  i):ii(l  to  workmen  in 
foreign  lands,  and  IIGG, 000,000  worth  of  these  articles 
brought  in  from  a])road  instead  of  being  made  at  home, 
and  sold  in  our  shoe  stores  as  cheap  as  in  English  retail 
sho])s  ? 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  75 

PAPER — "a    tax    ON"    KXOWLEDGE." 

'•'A  tax  on  knowledge"  is  wliut  free  traders  cull  the 
moderate  duty  of  20  i)er  cent,  on  printing  paper.  A 
great  cry  was  raised  about  it  all  at  once  in  1879.  Suppose 
it  is  a  tax  added  to  the  price  of  paper.  It  would  add 
four  cents  a  year  to  the  cost  of  a  seven-column  weekly 
newspaper !  In  war  days,  with  pajier  at  25  cents  per 
pound,  daily  papers  sold  at  about  their  present  prices. 
Did  newspapers  reduce  their  rates  in  1879,  while  getting 
their  paper  of  our  manufacturers  at  less  than  6  cents — 
half  what  it  cost  in  1872  ?  In  1872-3  the  price  was  12 
cents ;  it  fell  gradually  to  G  cents  and  less  in  the 
depression  of  1879,  rose  to  10  cents  in  "the  boom"  of 
1880,  and  is  now  down  to  6i-  to  7  cents,  with  the  duty 
unchanged.  If  the  tariff  is  responsible  for  the  rise,  why 
not  credit  it  with  the  fall  as  well  ? 

How  came  tliis  sudden  hue  and  cry  about  "a  tax  on 
knowledge  ?''  The  circulars  that  filled  the  land  had  all 
the  same  "ear-marks,"  as  coming  from  one  centre.  A 
Yankee  guess  would  put  it  at  free  trade  headquarters  in 
New  York. 

Englishmen  tell  ns  that  we  pay  all  the  duty  on  the 
goods  they  send  us,  but  at  home  they  tell  each  other 
how  tliey  are  taxed  by  our  tariff.  Their  statement  is 
like  the  almanac — "adapted  to  the  latitude."  Cana- 
dians, when  asking  for  reciprocity,  told  at  home  how 
tlieij  had  to  pay  the  duty  on  their  coal,  wool,  lumber, 
and  barley,  exported  to  the  United  States.  This  side 
the  line  we  were  told  that  the  same  duty  was  a  tax  on  us^ 

RICE — A    SOUTHERN"    COX^GKESSMAN^. 

In  the  House  of  Representatives.  January,  1883.  Hon, 


76  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

E.  Speer,  M.  C. ,  of  Georgia,  member  of  the  Ways  and 
Means  Committee,  made  the  following  remarks  : 

Mr.  Speer. — I  wish  to  say  to  the  gentleman  from  IlHnois 
[Mr  SparksJ  that  there  are  mau}'^  ways  in  which  this  system  of 
protection  protects  the  farmer.  I  will  give  one  instance  in  refer- 
ence to  the  rice-planters  of  Georgia  and  the  Carolinas.  Before  the 
war  rice  was  worth  $2  a  hundred.  When  the  war  came  our  whole 
system  of  labor  was  disorganized  and  the  rice  interest  was  swept 
out  of  existence.  After  the  war,  before  the  interest  was  built  up 
by  protection,  the  price  of  rice  per  hundred  in  this  country  was 
from  $13  to  $14.  The  tariff  had  its  beneficial  effect  on  that  inter- 
est, and  what  is  the  consequence?  Our  rice  interest  is  built  up 
again,  from  160,000  to  200,000  people  are  engaged  in  profitable 
agricultural  occupation,  and  rice,  instead  of  being  from  $12  to 
$14  per  hundred,  is  now  only  $4.25  to  $4.50. 

LOOSE   AND    EECKLESS    ASSEETIONS. 

Mr.  David  A.  Wells  of  Connecticut,  a  noted  free  trade 
authority,  formerly  a  protectionist,  and  a  disciple  of 
Henry  C.  Carey,  made  a  Western  tour  a  few  years  ago, 
and  spoke  in  our  leading  cities.  In  Detroit  he  held  up 
before  his  audience  a  table-knife  of  American  manu- 
facture, praised  the  skill  and  fine  machinery  used  by  our 
cutlery  makers,  but  regretted  they  were  "  taxed  60  per 
cent,  on  the  steel  they  use  by  the  tariff."  Up  to  1859 
English  steel  had  varied  little  for  twenty  years  from 
10  cents,  12^  cents  and  16  cents  for  different  grades, 
the  English  controlling  our  market  and  prices. 

With  a  protective  duty  our  steel  makers  took  away  that 
foreign  control  hy  their  competition,  and  9  cents,  10^ 
cents  and  13  cents  were  prices  for  the  same  grades. 
How  could  Mr.  Wells  ignore  these  facts  ?  Is  he  so 
ignorant  as  not  to  know  that  our  cutlery  competes  with 
that  of  free  trade  England,  the  world  over  ? 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  77 

Professor  Perry  left  his  place  in  AVilliums  College  last 
simng  to  visit  the  West  and  enlighten  the  people.  He 
told  us  that  the  "farmer  is  virtually  prohibited  from 
selling  his  hogs  outside  his  own  country  by  our  absurd 
tariff."  By  the  U.  S.  Agricultural  Report  for  1880  the 
exports  of  hogs,  bacon  and  hams  were  101,331,639.  The 
farmers  can  stand  a  good  deal  of  such  prohibition. 

Professor  Sumner  of  Yale  rivals  his  brother  teacher 
from  Williams  in  loose  assertions.  He  lately  said,  as  the 
Philadelphia  Press  reports,  that  "hundreds  of  poor 
women  worked  hard  for  fifty  cents  a  day  "  in  the  Willi- 
mantic  spool  thread  mills,  while,  in  fact,  none  work 
there  for  such  poor  pay,  and  their  average  earnings  are 
double  that  sum. 

Thomas  G.  Shearman,  an  attorney  in  Brooklyn,  N.  Y., 
came  to  Detroit  last  winter  to  lecture  on  free  trade. 
I  heard  him  say:  "The  worst  cloth  in  the  world  is 
made  in  the  United  States.  *  *  Ko  good  woolens  are 
made  in  America,"  and  noted  the  words  at  the  time. 

Against  his  assertion  I  put  the  impartial  statement  of 
a  foreign  expert.  M.  Louis  Chatel  was  the  French 
Government  Commissioner  to  our  Centennial  Exhibition 
in  1876  at  Philadelphia,  especially  to  study  si^inning  and 
weaving.  In  his  report  to  that  government  he  said  : 
"  The  Americans  can  justly  claim  a  very  large  share  in 
the  progress  attained  (in  woolens)  at  the  present  day," 
and  this  progress,  especially  in  staple  goods  "for  general 
consumption,  has  done  serious  injury  to  the  markets  of 
England  and  France."  He  especially  commended  the 
cloths  of  the  Globe  Woolen  Company  of  Utica,  N.  Y., 
for  "  perfectness  in  weaving  and  finish,"  and  said:  "  We 
arc  forced  to  admit  that  our  manufacturers  of  Vienne 
and  of  Bischmiller  (famed  French  mills)  can  no  longer 


78  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

compete,  either  in  cost  or  quality,  witli  the  goods  of 
this  American  company."  AYashington  Mills,  Lawrence, 
Mass.,  and  others,  were  also  highly  commended. 

Of  these  Globe  Mill  woolens  over  |G00,000  worth  were 
sold  in  New  York  city  in  1882 — beautiful  goods,  costing, 
some  of  them,  over  five  dollars  per  yard  at  wholesale. 
Comment  is  needed  on  this  striking  contrast.  So  far 
as  staple  goods  are  concerned,  one  case  of  many  may  be 
instanced.  Any  merchant  in  our  city  will  readily  grant 
that,  for  honest  wear,  the  cassimeres  of  the  Flint  Woolen 
Mills,  in  our  oAvn  State,  are  genuine  and  excellent. 

**THE    CONSOLATIOISrS    OF    THE    PROTECTED   FARMER" 

A    CANADIAN    VIEW. 

The  New  York  Free  Trade  League  a  few  years  ago 
circulated  a  sheet  entitled  "  The  People's  Pictorial  Tax- 
payer," purporting  to  illustrate,  by  various  cartoons  and 
pictures,  the  baleful  effect  of  levying  a  tax  on  such  for- 
eign products  as  compete  with  our  own.  Conspicuously 
displayed  on  the  borders  of  this  sheet  were  the  cards  of 
Wm.  Jessup  &  Sons,  manufacturers  of  steel  and  import- 
ers of  iron,  Sheffield,  England  ;  of  Congreve  &  Son, 
of  New  York,  agents  of  the  Toledo  Steel  Works,  of 
Sheffield  ;  of  A.  B.  Sands  &  Co.,  importers  of  drugs; 
of  John  Clark,  Jr.,  &  Co.,  foreign  manufacturers  of 
spool-cotton ;  of  Van  Wart  &  McCoy,  the  New  York 
agents  of  Van  Wart,  Son  &  Co.,  of  Birmingham,  and 
a  dozen  other  English  manufacturing  firms  and  their 
agents  in  New  York.  Besides  these  are  the  cards  of 
several  foreign  insurance  companies.  A  noble  set  of 
backers,  these,  to  teach  American  tax  payers  their  true 
interests  ! 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted  79 

The  principal  cartoon  is  entitled,  "How  the  tariff 
robs  the  farmer  and  every  workingman  to  benefit  the 
monopolists." 

Our  Canadian  neighbors  were  then  discussing  a  pro- 
tective tariff  to  shield  themselves  from  the  philan- 
thropic free  trade  of  the  mother  country,  which  they 
have  since  adopted.  The  Toronto  Mail,  an  able  advo- 
cate of  protection  for  Canadian  industry,  took  up  this 
Pictorial  Tax-payer,  and  other  like  sheets  in  the  United 
States,  and  commented  on  them  under  the  head  of 
"  Consolations  of  the  Protected  Farmer,"  in  a  keen  and 
clear  way,  as  follows  : 

"  The  Yankee  farmer  rises  in  the  morning  tolerably  refreshed. 
True,  he  has  been  sleeping  on  a  bed,  the  sheets,  blankets,  and  mat- 
tresses of  which  would  have  been  taxed  from  60  to  180  per  cent, 
had  they  been  imported  from  a  foreign  country.  But  they  are 
home-made,  and  his  dreams  have  not  been  disturbed  by  the  free 
trade  bugbear  that  '  protection  raises  the  price  of  the  home  man- 
ufactured article  up  to  at  least  the  price  of  the  imported  article 
plus  the  import  duty.'  Mr.  David  A.  Wells  and  other  agents  of 
the  Leeds  and  ^Manchester  manufacturers  once  tried  to  frighten 
him  with  this  bogy  ;  but  experience  has  taught  him  that  it  is  only 
a  make-believe.  There  is  an  import  duty  of  8  cents  a  yard  on 
cotton  sheeting,  but  he  buys  it  from  the  cotton  factory  in  his  mar- 
ket town  at  7  cents  a  yard,  and  sees  it  going  to  England  in  compe. 
tition  with  free  trade  cotton.  Moreover,  he  knows  that  it  is  to 
that  import  duty  he  owes  the  esta])lishment  of  the  neighboring 
cotton  factory,  whose  operatives  give  him  a  profitable  home  mar- 
ket for  rotation  crops.  He  is  well  satisfied  with  his  bed.  It  is 
home-made  ;  it  cost  him,  if  anything,  less  than  an  imported  arti- 
cle ;  and  its  manufacture  has  given  employment  to  artisans  who 
buy  the  products  of  his  farm  almost  direct  from  his  wagon. 

"He  is  not  alarmed  because  there  is  a  heavy  import  duty  on 
foreign  cloths,  boots,  and  cotton  shirts.  His  suit  from  head  to 
foot  is  of  "American  make  ;  he  thinks  this  is  better  for  him  than  if 
his  coat  had  come  from  the  west  of  England,  his  shirt  from  Man- 
chester, and  his  lx)ots  from  Stockport. 


80  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

Breakfast  over,  he  takes  to  his  farm  im])lements.  Foreiga 
implements,  such  as  shovels,  hoes,  wooden  pails,  churns,  reapers, 
etc.,  are  taxed  35  per  cent.  ;  and  in  1860,  when  the  battle  of  the 
Morrill  tariff  was  being  fought  in  Congress,  the  agents  of  the  great 
Bedford  and  Leicester  tirms  predicted  that  an  import  duty  on  their 
goods  would  ruin  farming  in  the  United  States.  He  has  discov- 
ered that  this  is  not  true,  and  that  Yankee  farm  implements  have 
become  the  .cheapest  and  best  in  the  world.  In  fact,  when  our 
farmer  contemplates  the  amazing  growth  of  this  industry,  it 
occurs  to  him  that  the  English  agents,  who  lobbied  and  even 
bribed  politicians  and  newspapers  to  oppose  the  high  tariff,  were 
not  actuated  so  much  by  regard  for  the  condition  of  the  Yankee 
farmer  as  by  the  consciousness  that  protection  would  deprive  them 
of  the  American  market,  and  by  the  fear  that  it  would  make  the 
Yankee  manufacturer  a  formidable  rival  in  other  markets. 

' '  This  is  what  the  farmer  thinks  at  his  work  during  the  fore- 
noon. He  hears  the  toot  of  the  dinner  horn,  and  sits  down  at  the 
table  nothing  put  out  by  the  reflection  that  tin  horns  of  foreign 
make  are  taxed  about  two  cents  each.  Neither  does  he  lose  his 
appetite  when  he  remembers  that  furniture,  such  as  the  chair  he 
is  sitting  on,  the  table  at  which  he  is  eating,  is  taxed  35  per  cent, 
when  of  foreign  make.  This  duty  has  helped  to  establish  furni- 
ture factories  and  to  give  employment  to  tens  of  thousands  of 
mechanics  at  home,  and  in  this  way  has  benefited  him. 

"After  dinner  he  sets  out  for  the  market  town,  and,  as  he  jour- 
neys thither,  he  pities  the  Canadian  farmer,  who,  as  a  rule,  has  to 
dispose  of  his  produce  to  the  middlemen  that  stand  like  a  row  of 
tax-gatherers,  each  levying  his  tithe  between  the  Kanuck  farm  and 
the  foreign  consumer.  He  wonders,  too,  does  this  old  Yankee 
farmer,  how  the  Canadian  farms  endure  wheat  and  barley  j'ear 
after  year,  and  rejoices  that  protection  has  given  him  a  home  mar- 
ket to  which  he  can  supply  almost  every  variety  of  crop.  He 
enters  the  market  town  at  one  o'clock,  and  his  sympathy  for  the 
Canadian  farmer  is  deepened  as  he  sees  troops  of  Canadian  opera- 
tives returning  to  the  factories  from  their  dinner. 

"  '  I  wonder, '  he  communes,  '  if  the  Kanuck  farmer  ever  sees 
a  crowd  of  Yankee  operatives  going  to  work  in  a  Canadian  fac- 
tory V  Guess  not.  Then  what  do  free  traders  mean  by  argu- 
ing that  protection,  such  as  we  Yankies  are  cursed  with,  ruins 


Tlie  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  81 

industry,  while  free  trade,  with  which  the  Kanucks  have  long 
been  blessed,  builds  it  up  and  makes  a  nation  great  ?  If  that 
were  so,  would  not  these  active  little  French-Canadians  be  at  work 
in  Montreal,  and  would  not  our  Yankee  mechanics  be  pouring 
over  there  also  ?' 

"By  this  time  he  has  reached  the  store,  and  disposes  of  his 
tomatoes,  potatoes,  etc.  With  the  money  received  in  papnent  he 
makes  his  little  purchases,  and  finds  no  small  consolation  in  know- 
ing that  almost  every  dollar  he  pays  out  goes  to  home  industries. 

"He  thinks  this  over  as  he  travels  homeward,  and  talks  protec- 
tion m.  free  trade  with  his  sons  in  the  evening.  One  of  them 
works  on  the  farm,  and  the  others  are  at  trades  in  the  town — 
Canada  has  had  no  attractions  for  them.  '  You  boys  are  all  here,' 
says  the  old  man,  '  and  I  guess  it  is  a  pretty  good  country,  pro- 
tection and  all.' " 

CHEMICALS. 

By  the  tentli  census  we  had  1,346  factories,  with 
$85,336,856  invested;  annual  sales  of  $117,128,657; 
employing  29,435  hands  in  this  industry;  using  586,089 
tons  of  coal,  and  consuming  raw  materials  worth 
$79,237,281  yearly. 

In  Philadelphia  and  New  York  alone  the  yearly 
manufacture  of  chemicals  reaches  $50,000,000.  Look 
at  a  few  facts  in  that  line.  On  flower  of  sulphur  the  duty 
equals  59  per  cent.,  its  price  abroad  4  cents  per  i^ound. 
With  the  duty  added  as  *'atax,"  it  should  sell  for  6 
cents,  but  it  only  brings  3  cents  in  our  market.  Ecfined 
borax,  sold  abroad  at  14  cents,  with  a  duty  of  10  cents, 
should  bring  24  cents  here,  but  home  competition  keeps 
it  down  to  14  cents.  Chloroform  is  too  sleepy  to  go  up 
to  $1.37|^,  where  the  ''tariU  is  a  tax"  theory  would  send 
it,  but  is  dull  at  75  cents.  Castor  oil  sells  abroad  at  9-^ 
cents  to  9f  cents  per  pound,  and  the  duty  is  rated  at 
equal  to  148  per  cent.,  which  would  bring  it  up  to  22 


82 


The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 


to  23  cents  here;  but  it  sells  at  12|^  to  15  cents.  Epsom 
salts,  with  its  foreign  price  of  ly^^^  cents  and  the  duty  or 
"tax"  of  78  per  cent,  added,  should  sell  at  '%^^  cents, 
but  does  not  rise  above  If  cents  per  pound,  even  to  meet 
free  trade  nonsense.  Strychnine  ought  to  sell  at  11.95 
per  ounce,  but  it  holds  fast  at  only  80  cents. 

FARMERS    THE    GREATEST     '' MONOPOLISTS " — THE    NON- 
SENSE   OF   IT  ! 

Nothing  so  completely  shows  the  absurdity  of  the 
*'  tariff  is  a  tax  "  assumption  as  to  apply  it  to  farm  pro- 
ducts. In  1870  we  imported  190,000  bushels  of  pota- 
toes, which  paid  a  duty  of  fifteen  cents  per  bushel,  or 
128,500.  We  raised  240,000,000  bushels,  and  on  this  whole 
crop  the  price  was  raised,  if  this  assumption  be  correct, 
fifteen  cents  per  bushel  by  this  "tax"  on  the  imported 
product.  This  logic  taxes  the  poor  people  who  raise  no 
potatoes  136,000,000  in  that  one  year  for  the  benefit  of 
a  few  greedy  grangers  ! 

In  1878,  in  a  congressional  speech,  Hon.  W.  D.  Kel- 
ley  gave  the  following  table  : 


Products. 

Bushels 
Raised  in 

1877. 

Bushels 
Exported. 

Home  Con- 
sumption. 

Bushels. 

Duty 

per 

bushel. 

Tax  on  home  con- 
sumers by   the 
Free  Trade  dog- 
ma that  the  du- 
ty is  added   to 
the  price. 

Wheat 

Barley 

Potatoes 

Com 

Oats 

Rye 

360,000,000 
35,600,000 

140,000,000 
1,340,000,000 

405,000,000 
22,100,000 

57,043,936 

1,186,936 

529,650 

73,100,518 
2,854,128 
2,237,000 

303,9.56,064 
34,413,871 
145.470,.350 
1,306,899,483 
402,145,872 
19,873,000 

$0  20 
15 
15 
10 
10 
10 

S60,.591,212  80 

5,163,080  65 

21,830,522  50 

136,089,948  20 

40,314,587  20 

1,987,300  00 

Total 

2,308,700,000 

136,941,361 

2,171,758,639 

$256,465,681  35 

TJie  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted.  83 

How  we  all  suffer,  that  these  gi-ain  growers  may  gain 
$250,000,000  yearly  at  our  cost!  Include  dairy  pro- 
ducts, and  meats,  gi-ant  that  the  producers  use  one- 
third  and  sell  the  rest,  and  we  are  taxed  over  1350,000,000 
yearly  to  fatten  these  rapacious  farmers  !  Can  absurdity 
go  farther  ?  The  fact  is  the  tariff  on  these  products 
makes  no  difference  with  their  price,  yet  pays  a  good 
revenue  to  the  government. 

Sometimes  the  admission  of  a  competitor  covers  the 
whole  gi'ound.  In  1879  Col.  Wrottlesey,  an  English- 
man, wrote  the  London  Times:  "The  Americans  have 
the  start  of  us,  *  *  and  unless  our  manufacturers 
bestir  themselves  they  will  completely  command  the 
markets  of  Europe."  Mr.  McIIardy,  in  his  report  to 
Parliament  as  one  of  the  British  commissioners  to  the 
Centennial  Exhibition  at  Philadelphia  in  1876  said:  "It 
is  foolish  not  to  recognize  the  fact  that  at  Philadelphia, 
Great  Britain  Avas  in  face  of  her  most  powerful  rival  in 
manufactures. "  How  is  this  rivalry  jjossible  unless  our 
qualities  and  prices  compete  with  theirs  in  foreign  lands? 
If  our  tariff  is  a  tax,  added  to  the  price  of  our  goods 
how  is  such  competition  possible? 

Added  evidence  of  the  absurd  folly  and  falsehood  of 
this  free  trade  assertion  is  abundant  but  needless;  what 
is  given  is  impregnaljle,  its  disproval  impossible. 

Bear  in  mind  that  this  assertion  is  intended  to  give 
the  idea  that  the  amount  of  any  duty  is  so  much  always 
added,  not  only  to  the  price  of  the  imported  article,  but 
to  the  price  of  all  like  articles  made  in  this  country  and 
that  this  added  burthen  falls  on  the  consumer  here,  who 
is  thus  craftily  and  heavily  robbed  for  the  benefit  of  pro- 
tected monopolists. 

Hon.  H.  Gr.  Turner,  M.  0.,  of  Georgia,  in  a  late  speech 


84  The  Free  Trade  Falsehood  Refuted. 

estimated  the  added  cost  to  consumers  caused  by  the 
tariff  at  $1,000,000,000, — so  much  profit  to  our  manu- 
facturers while  the  government  gets  less  than  1200,000,- 
000,  and  Hon.  W.  K.  Cox,  M.  C,  of  North  Carolina, 
figures  it  up  that  government  gets  $104,000,000  revenue 
from  duties  on  cotton  and  woolen  goods,  iron  and  steel, 
and  leather  imported,  but  the  makers  here  get  $553,- 
414,000.  Start  from  false  premises  and  it  is  easy  work 
to  make  a  false  case. 

These  men,  and  their  like,  liave  no  grouna  of  fact  to 
stand  on.  A  Hindoo  theory  is  that  this  earth  stands  on 
the  back  of  an  enormous  elephant,  and  that  each  of  his 
feet  rests  on  the  back  of  an  immense  tortoise.  Ask  the 
grave  Hindoo  pundit  what  the  four  tortoises  stand  on, 
and  he  shakes  his  head  solemnly,  but  gives  no  light.  He 
is  in  dim  fog  and  chaos,  where  these  men  reach  when 
facts  are  called  for.  Assumption  is  the  free  trade  tor- 
toise, standing  solid  on — nothing  ! 


CHAPTER  YII. 

A  TARIFF   FOR  REVENUE  ONLY   TAXES  THE  CON- 
SUMER—DUTIES—PRICES. 

Those  who  assert  that  a  protective  tariff  is  a  tax  on 
the  consumer  make  that  assertion  the  ground  for  advo- 
cating a  tariff  for  revenue  only.  By  that  advocacy  they 
uphold  the  very  tax  they  so  stoutly  denounce.  Revenue 
duties  on  tea,  coffee,  and  other  articles  we  cannot  pro- 
duce, and  on  which  there  can  be  no  home  competition, 
tend  to  raise  their  price.  The  English  consider  the  duty 
on  tea  as  a  permanent  tax  on  the  people  of  some 
20,000,000  yearly.  The  more  we  act  on  the  free  trade 
*'  axiom  "  that  protection  taxes  the  consumer  the  more 
we  shall  frame  our  tariffs  for  revenue  only,  and  thus  tax 
that  consumer  permanently. 

Briefly  stated,  the  case  is  as  follows  :  A  tariff  for 
revenue  only  is  a  permanent  tax  on  the  consumer,  with 
no  compensating  benefits.  A  protective  tariff  pays  the 
surest  revenues  to  our  government,  is  sometimes  a  tran- 
sient tax,  but  always  has  compensating  benefits  from  the 
start,  and  always  results  in  low  prices. — being  thus  a 
boon  rather  than  a  tax. 

Experience  and  the  laws  of  trade  show  that  when  we 
have  any  well  established  industry  producing  the  greater 
part  of  what  we  consume,  this  home  product  controls 
our  prices,  home  competition  cheapens  them,  and  the 
foreigner  pays  the  duty,  which  does  not  affect  the  price. 
Imported  cotton  cloth,  for  instance,  affects  prices  little, 
if  any.     When  we  make  any  article,  and  import  a  large 

85 


86  A  Tariff  for  lievenue  Only 

share  of  what  we  use  of  the  like  article,  sometimes  the 
foreigner  pays  the  duty  and  sometimes  we  pay  a  part,  or 
supply  and  demand  fluctuate,  but  our  competition  with 
the  foreign  maker  always  reduces  iwices.  A  protective 
duty  on  a  new  industry  may  sometimes  keep  the  price 
up  for  a  short  time  ;  sometimes  the  foreigner  reduces 
his  jirice  to  cripple  our  new  industry,  and  we  reap  the 
benefit, — as  in  the  case  of  steel  rails,  on  which  English 
prices  were  reduced  some  $20  per  ton  as  soon  as  they 
were  made  here. 

Whenever  an  article  of  home  manufacture  happens  to 
be  dearer  than  a  like  foreign  article  the  difference  is 
surely  held  up  as  a  tax  on  the  consumer,  caused  by  the 
duty,  but  when  home  competition  brings  the  price  down, 
as  it  has  done  in  many  cases,  that  is  ignored.  To  point 
back  to  higher  prices  under  lower  duties  would  greatly 
damage  a  free  trade  treatise.  Home  competition,  home 
markets,  better  wages,  varied  employment  and  capital 
used  at  home  are  silently  passed  by ;  to  exaggerate 
alleged  injuries  and  ignore  real  benefits  is  the  aim. 
The  process  by  which  manufacturers  are  shown  to 
gain  immense  profits  is  equally  incorrect  and  untrue. 
Sometimes  a  factory  pays  nothing  to  its  owner  for  years 
and  then  come  good  dividends.  The  years  without 
profit  are  ignored,  but  the  good  dividend  is  paraded 
and  magnified  to  keep  up  prejudices  against  "the  mo- 
nopolists." Hon.  AV.  A.  Russell,  M.  C,  gives  the 
reports  of  fifty-one  textile  manufactories  known  in 
Boston,  showing  their  dividends  for  ten  years,  .from 
1873  to  1882  inclusive,  to  be  ^^^  per  cent,  yearly  aver- 
age on  155,000,000  capital.  Approximately  it  would 
be  safe  to  say  that  for  thirty  years  our  factories  and 
mills  in  the  whole  country  have  not  paid  theil"  owners 


Taxes  the  Consumer.         _  87 

five  per  cent,  yearly.  Many  cases  can  be  given  where 
a  single  crop  has  paid  for  the  farmer's  land  and  labor. 
Would  it  be  fair  to  hold  them  up  as  proofs  that  those 
farmers  are  constantly  getting  rich  at  the  cost  of  the 
consumers  of  food? 

Start  any  new  industry,  with  fair  protection,  and  it 
gains  and  grows  and  these  results  follow  : — Ix'tter  pro- 
cesses and  machinery,  economy  of  production,  less  cost 
of  manufacture  on  a  larger  scale,  ability  sometimes  to 
pay  more  for  raw  material  and  for  wages,  yet  to  sell  the 
product  lower,  and  a  rise  in  the  price  of  lands  in  the 
vicinity  along  with  the  growing  cheapness  of  the  product 
of  the  mill. 

THE    OLD    STORE    AND   THE   NEW. 

Suppose  there  is  a  great  store  on  some  country  road 
where  all  the  people  have  been  obliged  to  trade,  and  a 
new  shop  starts  across  the  highway.  Galled  and  fleeced 
by  the  monopoly  of  the  old  store  they  patronize  the  new 
one  to  get  the  benefits  of  a  healthy  competition. 

Our  fifteen  hundred  woolen  mdls  are  the  new  store  on 
our  side  of  the  (ocean)  highway.  How  competition 
with  the  old  shop,  kept  by  a  solid  Englishman  on  the 
other  side,  has  worked  may  be  shown  by  a  word  from 
Hon.  W.  S,  Shallenberger,  of  Pennsylvania,  who  spoke 
on  behalf  of  the  National  Association  of  Wool  Growers 
at  the  New  York  Tariff  Convention  in  November,  1881. 
He  said :  "  On  the  subject  of  domestic  clothing,  I 
desire  to  add  a  word.  While  it  is  true  that  the  price  of 
fine  broadcloth  is  cheaper  in  Europe  than  here,  our 
staple  cloth  can  be  furnished  to  the  workingman  for  less 
than  such  cloth  costs  abroad.  I  rely  on  the  statement 
of  no  less  a  person  than  the  Quartermaster-General  of 


88  A  Tariff  f 07'  Revenue  Only 

the  United  States  army  for  the  inforniiition  that  the 
clothing  of  that  army,  when  qiiality  is  considered,  is 
cheaper  than  that  of  any  army  in  the  world.  There  is 
an  intelligent  gentleman  sitting  here  by  me  who  has 
traveled  around  the  world  in  a  suit  of  clothing  (coat, 
vest  and  pants)  costing  112,  the  quality  of  Avhich  has 
been  commented  on  by  foreigners  all  over  the  world  as 
being  remarkable. " 

Eeduce  the  product  of  these  woolen  mills,  and  it  would 
be  like  the  country  merchant  in  the  new  store  being 
obliged  to  lessen  the  quantity  and  variety  of  his  stock. 
The  old  store  across  the  road  would  get  more  trade  and 
better  i^rofit  at  the  cost  of  the  i^eople. 

Our  i)rices  are  not  always  as  low  as  m  Europe.  Bring 
wages  down  from  thirty  to  a  hundred  per  cent.,  or  to 
the  British  and  European  level,  and  we  could  undersell 
the  world.  Shall  we  brutalize  our  people  to  do  that  ? 
To  drag  man  down  that  iron  may  be  cheap,  would  be 
a  crime  and  a  blunder. 

But  the  great  staples  used  by  the  people  grow  cheaper 
under  protection.  The  British  sometimes  admit  that  the 
users  of  iron  among  us  are  the  better  off  for  our  policy, — 
and  that  means  everybody,  for  iron  is  used  in  hut  and 
palace,  on  the  farm  and  in  the  sho]).  The  woolens  most 
used  are  as  cheap  as  abroad,  while  finer  goods,  luxuries 
for  those  who  buy  them,  are  higher.  Almost  a  third  of 
our  customs-duties  comes  from  the  tariff  on  textile 
fabrics,  cottons  and  woolens  pay  a  large  part  of  it,  and 
a  good  share  of  that  the  foreigner  pays  Avitliout  affecting 
our  prices.  Even  if  a  tariff  is  a  tax,  since  we  prosper 
more  with  protection  than  with  revenue  tariffs  on  the 
free  trade  plan,  we  had  better  ])ay  it  and  take  the  good 
results  as  abundant  compensation. 


Taxes  the  Consumer.  89 

On  the  broad  scale,  however,  there  is  no  doubt  that  the 
growth  of  our  protected  manufactures  gives  us  better 
goods  at  lower  cost  than  we  should  pay  without  these 
useful  home  industries.  Facts  prove  this,  and  that 
proof  stamps  the  free  trade  assertion  tliat  a  tariff  is  a 
tax  on  the  consumer  as  an  assumption  without  evidence. 

We  must  bear  in  mind  that  without  protective  tariffs 
our  great  industries  could  not  have  grown  to  their  pres- 
ent magnitude,  or  our  country  have  reached  its  present 
wealth.  Our  manufactures,  by  the  last  census,  were 
#5,369,000  in  1880,  mostly  used  at  home.  It  is  a  vast 
attainment  of  these  industries  to  reach  the  capacity  of 
such  large  supplies  for  our  home  wants.  Suppose  they 
were  reduced  one-fourth.  We  should  be  compelled  to 
pay  foreigners,  mostly  British,  $1,300,000,000  yearly; 
our  balance  of  trade  would  turn  against  us  ;  gold  would 
flow  ont  to  Europe ;  bonds  go  abroad  for  market ; 
farmers'  home  markets  and  prices  languish  ;  Avages  fall, 
and  imported  goods  rise,  and  a  period  of  panic  and 
bankruptcy  follow. 

A    PROTECTIVE   TARIFF   LIKE    A    LEVEE    OR   A    FENCE. 

Why  need  a  tariff  at  all  on  articles  in  which  we  can 
compete  with  the  Avorld,  and  on  which  foreign  importers 
pay  the  duty  if  they  are  brought  here  ?  There  will 
always  be  imports  of  special  styles  of  goods,  and  a 
duty  on  them  will  yield  needed  revenue  to  our  govern- 
ment. We  want  a  duty,  also,  as  a  barrier  against  possi- 
ble importations  made  with  a  purpose  and  to  our  injury. 
When  Prussia,  in  1818,  established  some  protective 
duties,  a  member  of  the  British  Parliament  advocated 
flooding  that  country  with  British  goods,  even  at  a  sac- 
rifice. 


90  A  Tariff  for  Hevenue  Only 

David  Syme,  an  able  English  free  trader,  went  to 
Australia  and  saw  there  the  workings  of  a  policy  wliich 
led  the  people  of  that  British  colony  to  adopt  a  pro- 
tective tariff.     He  frankly  said  : 

"  The  manner  in  which  English  capital  is  used  to  maintain  her 
manufacturing  supremacy  is  well  understood  abroad.  In  any 
quarter  of  the  globe  where  a  competition  shows  itself  as  likely  to 
interfere  with  her  monopoly,  immediately  the  capital  of  her  man- 
ufacturers is  massed  in  that  particular  quarter,  and  goods  are 
exported  in  large  quantities  and  sold  at  such  prices  that  outside 
competition  is  effectually  counted  out.  English  manufacturers 
have  been  known  to  export  goods  to  a  distant  market  and  sell 
them  under  cost  for  years,  with  a  view  to  getting  the  market  into 
their  own  hands  again." 

This  is  the  British  avowed  policy,  "to  gain  and  keep 
foreign  markets  and  step  in  for  the  whole  trade  when 
prices  revive." 

Sometimes  it  is  good  policy  for  foreign  manufacturers, 
when  their  markets  at  liome  are  glutted,  to  send  goods 
here,  even  at  a  loss,  and  reap  the  benefit  by  relieving 
their  nearer  marts  of  a  surplus.  To  this  Hon.  A.  S. 
Hewitt,  of  New  York,  alluded  in  saying :  "  These 
duties  have  conferred  one  great  benefit.  In  the  late  era 
of  depression  (1873,  etc.),  they  have  prevented  this 
country  from  being  the  sink  into  which  the  surplus  iron 
of  other  countries  would  be  flung.  Had  the  duties  been 
low  enough  iron  importations  would  have  destroyed  our 
business  and  closed  our  establishments." 

Such  closing  would  have  raised  prices  by  making  us 
dependent  on  foreigners.  Even  the  reduction  of  our 
duties  sometimes  raise  prices  abroad.  In  1870,  when 
the  tariff  on  jiig  iron  was  reduced  %'Z  per  ton,  the  Scotch 
makers  at  once  added  tliat  sum  to  the  price. 

In  1880  the  mere  jjroposal  in  Congress,  by  a  bill  wliich 


Taxes  the  Consumer.  91 

did  not  pass,  to  reduce  largely  the  duty  on  steel  rails, 
sent  the  price  up  in  England  ten  dollars  in  three  days. 
"  The  Minneajmlis  Wood  and  Iron,"  a  journal  from 
the  new  and  beautiful  manufacturing  city  by  the  Falls 
of  St.  Anthony,  makes  this  excellent  comparison: 

"  The  mechanic,  trader,  farmer,  or  manufacturer  who  desires 
a  removal  of  the  protective  tariff  may  be  compared  to  au  inhab- 
itant of  the  low-lying  lands  bordering  on  the  Mississippi  river  whO' 
advocates  cutting  the  levee  which  protects  him  and  his  possessions, 
from  the  hungry  flood  without.  With  the  levee  in  good  condition 
labor  is  rewarded  by  increase,  and  prosperity  reigns.  Destroy  it, 
and  decay  takes  the  place  of  fruitful  growth,  and  haggard  poverty 
reigns  instead  of  smiling  plenty.  Let  the  dwellers  behind  the  bar- 
rier of  protection  examine  it  closely  and  watch  it  constantly.  It 
may  be  too  strong  in  some  places,  in  others  too  weak;  but  as  they 
value  their  lives  let  them  preserve  its  stability  unimpaired.  Then, 
as  the  dwellers  behind  the  levee  use  the  broad  waters  beyond  for 
the  transportation  of  themselves  and  their  products  wheresoever 
they  will,  so  the  nation  safely  intrenched  behind  its  tariff  sea-wall 
can  venture  forth  to  trade  and  grow  rich  throughout  the  earth, 
secure  in  the  thought  that  return  when  they  may  they  will  find 
the  fields  left  behind  as  blooming  and  fertile  as  when  they  bade 
them  farewell." 

A  witty  man  being  asked:  "  What  is  the  use  of  a  duty 
higher  than  the  article  really  needs?"  answered  in  the 
Yankee  fashion  by  asking  a  question:  '•  What  is  the  use 
of  a  fence  higher  than  the  field  it  encloses?" 

WHY    DO    WE    KOT     EXPORT    MAJSTUFACTURES     LARGELY  ? 

This  question  is  often  asked,  honestly  or  captiously. 
The  answer  is  easy.  Only  a  hundred  years  ago  we 
escaped  from  the  grasp  of  that  British  2>ower  that  had 
always  crushed  our  manufactures,  and  one  of  whose 
eminent  men  (Lord  Chatham,  in  1772),  declared  that 
"  the  colonists  should  not  be  allowed  to  make  a  hobnail 


^2  A  Tariff  for  Revenue  Only 

for  themselves."  We  started  poor  and  witliout  manu- 
factures. For  a  long  time  every  new  industry  had  a 
struggle  for  life  through  the  varying  and  uncertain  legis- 
lation of  inexperienced  men,  and  from  want  of  capital. 
In  tliis  single  century  we  have  reached  a  product  of  over 
$5,369,000,000  in  1880,  supplying  nine-tenths  of  the 
wants  of  fifty  million  people,  the  greatest  buyers,  per 
head,  in  the  world.  Our  population  grows  two  millions 
annually,  and  our  manufactures  must  increase  over 
$200,000,000  a  year  to  supply  tliis  large  addition  to  our 
numl)ers.  Nothing  in  the  industrial  progress  of  the 
world  equals  this  great  achievement  of  our  single  century 
of  jieaceful  industry  !  And,  beyond  even  this,  Ave  export 
to  distant  countries.  England's  very  life  depends  on  a 
great  export  trade  in  her  manufactures;  our  life  grows 
sure  and  strong  and  Ave  first  supply  our  vast  and  increas- 
ing homo  demand.  Let  us  do  that,  and  our  exports  will 
dispose  of  our  surplus. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

SOME  FREE  TRADE  FALLACIES  ANSWERED. 

It  has  been  shown  that  free  trade  efforts  in  this 
country  are  heartily  approved  by  the  classes  in  England 
who  expect  to  gain  most  profit  from  their  success.  It  is 
also  significant  that  the  staple  assertions  of  free  trade 
theorists  with  us  are  of  English  origin,  and  have  long- 
been  common  in  that  country,  showing  an  inspiration 
here  drawn  from  'Hhe  fast  anchored  isle"  across  the 
Atlantic.     Let  us  look  at  a  few  of  these  assertions. 

''  PROTECTIONS'    WILL    FETTER     AXU    DECREASE    EXPORTS 
AXD  IMPORTS." 

The  assumption  is  that  people  abroad  will  not  buy  of 
us  while  we  put  tariff  barriers  in  the  way  of  their  selling- 
to  us.  Our  great  foreign  trade,  with  its  aggregate  of 
$1,499,901,099  in  1880,  an  increase  of  some  1500,000,- 
000  in  ten  years,  growing  under  a  protective  tariff  and 
larger  for  these  years  than  ever  before,  refutes  that 
assertion. 

Look  back  and  we  shall  find  our  exports  and  imports 
increased  in  our  protective  periods  and  grew  less  when- 
ever we  approached  the  "  tariff  for  revenue  only"  policy. 

Our  exports  to  Great  Britain  in  1879  were  over  1500,- 
000,000,  our  imports  $100,000,000.  They  bought  our 
grain,  cotton  and  provisions  because  they  needed  them, 
and  our  duties  on  their  articles  did  not  stand  in  the  way. 
We  buy  coffee  from  Brazil,  tea  from  China  and  sugar 


t)4  Some  Free  Trade  Fallacies  Answered. 

from  Cuba  largely,  because  we  want  them,  but  these  coun- 
tries do  not  buy  of  us  half  as  much  as  we  do  from  them. 
Let  us  see  how  an  able  English  protectionist  meets 
this  assertion  in  that  country.  Sir  J.  B.  Byles,  in  his 
"Sophisms  of  Free  Trade,"  which  has  passed  through 
ten  editions  in  England,  said  in  1880  :  "  Our  answer  to 
this  assertion  is  an  appeal  to  facts.  No  nation  has 
adopted  the  theory  and  practice  of  protection  to  the 
same  extent  as  England ;  no  nation  lias,  at  the  same 
time,  enjoyed  so  extensive  and  lucrative  a  foreign  trade. 
For  centuries  the  greatest  protection  in  the  world  has 
coincided  with  the  greatest  foreign  trade  in  the  world. 
In  truth,  the  domestic  activity,  industry  and  prosperity, 
fostered  by  the  jirotective  system,  is  the  surest  basis  of 
a  permanent,  extensive  and  mutual  foreign  trade.  In 
the  first  place,  with  protection  and  a  certain  home  mai'- 
ket,  have  arisen  tlie  means  of  purchase.  Under  a  strict 
'and  Jealous  system  of  protection  we  have  seen  the  rise 
of  Manchester,  Birmingham,  Sheffield,  Bradford,  and 
other  cities.  We  have  seen  skill  and  machinery  brought 
to  perfection.  Protection  has  not  blunted  the  invention 
or  superseded  the  ingenuity  of  our  countrymen.  On  the 
contrary,  our  cottons  and  woolens  and  hardware  were 
the  best  in  the  world.  What  England  might  have  been 
wWiout  protection  from  foreign  manufactures,  we  know 
not.  She  might  have  been  what  Ireland  is  now  without 
protection  from  English  manufactures.  But  it  is  certain 
that  with  protection  the  means  of  purchase  have  been 
created  and  multiplied  in  a  degree  marvellous  and 
transcending  all  anticipation.  *  *  With  protection 
has  arisen  the  indispensable  pre-rcquisite  to  foreign 
trade — things  to  give  in  exchange  for  foreign  commodi- 
ties, the  means  of  purchase — exports." 


tSome  Free  Trade  Fallacies  Answered.  95 


■"  PROTECTED     MANUFACTURES     HAVE     A     SICKLY     AND 
HOT-BED    GROAVTH." 

With  this  assertion  come  pictures  of  growing  oranges 
under  hot-house  ghiss  in  ScotUmd,  of  raising  figs  in 
warm  rooms  in  Maine,  and  all  sorts  of  foolish  things  for 
thoughtless  people  to  laugh  at.  Look  at  facts,  and 
surely  we  see  nothing  but  vigor  and  benefit  in  the  great 
industries  of  our  land.  Our  woolen  mills  buy  all  the 
wool  of  our  sheep  growers.  Our  iron  and  steel  mills, 
with  the  manufactures  therefrom,  and  the  allied  ore  and 
coal  products,  employ  some  050,000  persons  (estimate 
in  1870  of  Iron  and  Steel  Association,  in  Philadelphia). 
These  and  other  industries  makes  a  larger  and  better 
home  market  for  farm  products  than  ever  opened 
abroad.     Nothing  sickly  in  all  tliis. 

Let  us  see  how  the  English  writer  shows  up  this 
sophistry. 

"All  our  British  manufactures  took  their  rise  in  a 
system  of  protective  duties  so  high  as  to  amount  to  pro- 
hibition." "They  are  the  greatest,  and,  until  lately, 
the  least  sickly  of  any."  "  Protection  to  French  indus- 
try, from  the  days  of  Colbert,  has  been  and  will  be  the 
policy  of  France.  Her  manufactures,  though  inferior 
to  ours,  have  augmented,  since  peace,  in  an  even  greater 
ratio,  but  under  strict  protection."  Look  at  Kussia. 
Mr.  Cobden  has  recently  visited  their  protected  textile 
manufactures.  According  to  him,  tliese  manufactures, 
which  should  have  been  sickly  and  stunted  according 
to  these  theories,  now  threaten  a  rivalry  with  Great 
Britain."  "In  every  instance  of  nations  adopting  the 
protective  system,  manufactures  have  been  created,  nctt 
sickly,  but  healthy  and  flourisiiing,  often  against  natural 


96  Sortie  Free  Trade  Fallacies  Answered. 

disadvantages.  In  all  cases  industry  has  been  forced 
into  an  artificial  channel ;  but  the  result  has  been  solid 
and  prodigious  prosperity." 

"buy    I]Sr    THE    CHEAPEST   MARKET." 

A  tariff  stands  in  the  way  of  this,  we  are  told,  and  is 
therefore,  at  best,  only  a  necessary  evil  to  be  got  out  of 
the  way  as  soon  as  possible.  A  witty  Irishman  in  this 
country  was  telling  how  cheap  goods  were  in  his  old 
home,  and  how  much  he  could  buy  there  for  a  sixpence. 
"  Why  did  you  come  here  then  ?"  he  was  asked.  "  And 
shure,  where  could  I  get  the  sixpence  at  home  ?"  Avas  his 
quick  reply.  He  burst  the  bubble  of  "  cheapest  mar- 
ket." Free  trade  fails  to  jiut  the  sixpences  into  people's 
pockets. 

^'the  purchase  of  foreign  articles,  if  cheaper 
thalsr  those  at  home,  so  much  clear  gaik." 

Adam  Smith,  the  apostle  of  free  trade,  says  : 

' '  The  capital  employed  in  purchasing  in  one  part  of  a  country 
in  order  to  sell  in  another  part,  the  produce  of  the  industry  of 
that  country,  generally  replaces  by  such  operation  two  distinct 
capitals  that  had  both  been  emploj^ed  in  its  agriculture  or  manu- 
factures, and  thus  enables  them  to  continue  that  employment. 

"The  capital  used  in  buying  foreign  goods  for  domestic  con- 
sumption, when  the  purchase  is  made  by  the  produce  of  domestic 
industry,  replaces  also  two  distinct  capitals,  but  one  of  them  only 
supports  domestic  industry ;  the  otJmr  supports  foreign  industi'y, 
and  therefore  foreign  trade  will  give  hut  o)ie-half  the  encouragement 
to  the  industry  or  protective  labor  of  a  country  that  domestic 
or  internal  trade  does." 

We  must  bear  in  mind  that  a  nation,  whether  it  buy 
abroad  or  produce  at  home,  can  have  no  more  than  it 
produces.      The  development  of    its   home   producing 


Some  Frte  Trade  Fallacies  Answered.        97 

power  is  therefore  the  only  true  test  of  its  i)rosperity, 
and — Adam  Smith  being  our  witness — the  importation, 
of  articles  we  can  and  do  make  or  produce  lessens  that 
development  one-half. 

If  we  can  make  a  roll  of  cloth,  for  instance,  for  150, 
and  buy  it  in  England  for  $45,  the  buyer  may  gain  five 
dollars,  but  the  nation  will  really  lose  150  which  it 
might  use  at  home,  and  England  will  gain  that  much, 
and  the  buyer  of  the  cloth  will  soon  find  his  ability  to 
purchase  decrease,  and  so  will  lose  in  the  long  run. 

We  must  also  bear  in  mind  that  there  is  no  discrete 
degree,  no  clear  line  of  separation,  between  producer  and 
consumer.  Every  producer  consumes,  every  maker  is 
also  a  buyer ;  and  every  consumer  produces,  or  lives  on 
the  income  of  producers.  They  stand  or  fall  together. 
Interdependent,  their  interest  is  one. 

"the    'BALAlSrCE  OF  TRADE'   THEORY  FALLACIOUS — AN 

EXCESS   OF   IMPORTS   OVER    EXPORTS    PROOF   OF 

GROWTH    I^r    WEALTH." 

A  statement  like  this,  for  instance,  will  illustrate  the 
free  trade  method  of  showing  the  fallacy  of  our  export 
and  import  reports  :  A  cargo  of  wheat  goes  out  from 
New  York  to  Liverpool  valued  at  150,000,  and  that 
makes  so  much  in  our  official  statement  of  exports ; 
but  the  American  owner  sells  it  in  England  for  1^00,000, 
and  gains  110,000,  which  is  added  wealth  to  this  coun- 
try, but  makes  no  official  show  in  Government  reports. 
Or  he  may  invest  all  his  |G0,000  in  Avoolens  to  be 
imported,  and  that  sum  increases  our  report  of  total 
imports,  showing  in  the  transaction  an  excess  of  110,000 
on  the  import  side,  but  really  representing  no  added 
debt  abroad,  but  profit  on  exports  instead.     Doubtless 


98  Some  Free  Trade  Fallacies  Answered. 

such  transactions  sometimes  occur  and  partially  with 
this  result,  but  the  drawbacks  are  serious.  A  large  part 
of  our  exports  are  bought  here  by  foreigners  or  their 
agents,  and  the  profits  go  to  them.  Had  the  supposed 
American  cargo  of  wheat  been  exchanged  for  domestic 
woolens,  all  the  gains  would  have  remained  at  home  ; 
but  in  the  supposed  case,  the  foreign  maker  of  woolens 
gets  his  profits  there,  and  pays  his  costs  of  making, 
wages,  &c.,  there.  The  goods  imported  into  this  coun- 
try are  heavily  undervalued  in  many  of  our  Custom 
House  invoices,  on  wliich  they  pay  duty,  and  really  sold 
at  much  higher  rates  ;  and  such  undervaluation  overbal- 
ances the  occasional  cases  like  that  supposed  above. 
British  shipping  gets  $100,000,000  yearly  freight  on  our 
exports,  to  their  profit,  and  that  immense  profit  of 
theirs — to  our  loss — makes  no  show  in  our  official  state- 
ments. No  protectionist  would  lay  an  embargo  on 
international  trade,  but  would  recognize  its  use  and 
necessity ;  but  when  we  find  a  nation  buying  more  than 
it  sells  for  any  considerable  time— that  is,  with  imports 
greater  than  exports — that  nation  is  growing  poor.  The 
fact  that  such  adverse  '* balance  of  trade"  is  always 
looked  upon  with  alarm,  and  spoken  of  in  financial 
circles  with  grave  apprehension,  tells  the  whole  story. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

PROTECTION  AND  THE  FARMERS. 

Many  farmers  are  told,  and  lionestly  believe,  that  only 
the  manufacturer  has  protective  duties,  while  the  farm 
pi'oducts  are  open  to  free  trade.  The  present  tariff 
laws  impose  the  following  direct  protective  duties  on 
agricultural  products  :  Eice  cleaned,  2^  cents  per 
pound  ;  wheat,  20  cents  per  bushel ;  wheat  flour,  20 
per  cent. ;  Indian  corn,  10  cents  per  bushel ;  oats,  10 
cents  per  bushel ;  rye,  10  cents  per  bushel ;  barley,  10 
cents  per  bushel ;  butter,  4  cents  per  pound  ;  cheese,  4 
cents  per  pound;  potatoes,  15  cents  per  bushel;  tobacco, 
unmanufactured,  35  cents  per  pound  ;  sugar,  from  1^  to 
3|-  cents  per  pound;  live  animals,  20  per  cent. ;  those  for 
breeding  purposes  are  admitted  free  to  benefit  the 
farmers  ;  beef  and  pork,  1  cent  per  pound  ;  wool,  from 
2^  to  10  and  12  cents  per  pound;  and  hay,  $2.00  j^er  ton. 
These  duties,  and  others  on  lesser  products,  tend  to  keep 
out  foreign  competitors,  especially  on  our  northern  bor- 
ders, and  leave  our  home  market  almost  exclusively  free 
for  our  own  farmers. 

From  1789  to  1842  an  import  duty  of  three  cents  jjer 
pound  was  placed  on  cotton,  and  only  removed  when 
utterly  useless.  It  was  needed  for  a  time  to  encourage 
the  growth  of  that  great  staple. 

The  last  appeal  of  the  Cobden  Club — the  Mongredien 
Western  Farmer  tract,  sent  over  here  by  car-loads — 
is  like  all  the  rest  from  that  quarter.     Its  real  meaning 

99 


100  Protection  and  the  Fanaers. 

(which  they  do  not  give)  is  :  Let  England  be  the  work- 
shop of  the  Western  workl,  and  you  our  granary.  You 
grow  the  food  and  raw  material  and  let  us  work  it  up 
and  send  the  product  back  to  you  at  our  own  price,  and 
so  get  the  lion's  share  of  the  profits. 

On  the  opening  page  of  this  tract  we  are  told,  "  He 
(tlieWestern  farmer)  is  heavily  taxed  to  support  unprofit- 
able manufactures  in  the  Eastern  States,"  and  the 
charges  are  rung  on  Western  farmer  and  Enstern  manu- 
facturer. The  large  manufactures  of  the  West  are 
ignored.  The  benefits  of  the  home  market  are  also  case 
into  convenient  darkness. 

But  the  farmer  is  learning  that  mills  and  factories  aL 
his  door  are  his  natural  allies.  He  learned  it  long  ago 
in  the  East.  Mr.  Greeley  tells  a  story  that  will  illustrate 
this.  '"'A  farmer  near  Canaan,  Connecticut,  had  always 
opposed  protection  as  enriching  the  manufacturer  at  the 
expense  of  his  own  class.  In  1843  he  contracted  for 
clearing  100  acres  of  his  woodland  at  $10  per  acre  and 
what  could  be  made  from  the  wood.  Before  the  job 
was  finished  the  tariff  of  that  year  was  i^assed,  a  furnace 
for  making  pig  iron  from  charcoal  was  put  up  in  his 
neighljorhood,  and  its  owners  paid  him  120  per  acre  for 
the  wood  on  two  hundred  acres  of  like  woodland.  Here 
was  a  difference  of  16,000  to  him  between  iron  made  at 
home  and  imported  (and  a  liome  market  for  all  he 
raised,  from  cabbages  to  cattle,  besides)  The  country 
is  thickly  dotted  with  cases  like  this." 

In  1858  the  yearly  jn'oft  of  British  cotton  manufactures 
was  estimated  at  $188,000,000,  and  the  total  value  of  our 
cotton  cro])  at  $184,000,000. 

Every  cotton  mill  in  the  Soutli  keeps  a  part  of  that 
profit  at  home,  saves  transportation,  pays  better  prices 


Protection  and  the  Fanners.  101 

for  cotton  and  opens  new  markets  for  other  farm  in-oducts 
which  should  alternate  the  cotton  crops  in  the  fields 
around  the  factory. 

SELLING    CHEAP   AXD   BUYING   DEAK— OLD   TIME 
EXPERIENCES. 

Before  manufactures  were  fairly  established  in  this 
countiy,— in  those  days  when  AndreAv  Jackson  asked: 
*'  Where  shall  the  American  farmer  find  a  home  market 
for  his  products?"  our  farmers  were  in  poor  condition 
indeed,  selling  cheap  and  buying  dear  as  compared  to 
tlieir  i)resent  situation. 

An  Oliio  pioneer  once  told  me  of  hauling  his  wlieat 
forty  miles  to  Cleveland,  selling  it  at  forty  cents  a  bushel, 
and  buying  salt  to  haul  home  at  five  dollars  a  barrel,  and 
of  selling  tlieir  butter  at  five  cents  per  pound  to  buy  tea 
at  one  dollar  fifty  cents,  and  calico  at  tliirty  cents  a  yard. 
Mr.  Ewing,  of  Oliio,  in  a  speecii  in  tlie  United  States 
Senate  iji  February.  1833,  made  tliis  graphic  statement: 
"Every  farmer  in  Ohio  loni?  knew  and  felt  the  pressure.  Year 
after  year  their  stacks  of  wheat  stood  unthreshed;  so  low  was  it 
reduced,  in  comparison  with  manufactured  articles,  that  I  have 
known  forty  bushels  of  wheat  given  for  a  pair  of  boots;  such  was 
the  state  of  things  in  the  Western  country  prior  to,  and  at  the  time 
of,  the  revision  of  the  tariff  in  1824." 

In  a  spcecli  at  Great  Falls,  New  Hampsliire,  February 
21,  1872,  by  Henry  Wilson,  afterwards  Vice-President 
of  the  United  States,  he  said: 

"The  first  month  I  worked  after  I  was  twenty-one  years  of  age, 
I  went  into  the  woods,  drove  team,  cut  mill-logs  and  wood  rose 
m  the  morning  before  daylight  and  worked  hard  until  after 'dark 
at  night,  and  I  received  for  it  the  magnificent  sum  of  six  dollars 
Each  of  those  dollars  looked  as  large  to  me  as  the  moon  looked 
to-night. 


102  Protection  and  the  Farmers. 

' '  On  the  farm  on  which  I  served  an  apprenticeship  I  have  seen 
the  best  men  who  ever  put  scythe  in  grass  working  for  from  fifty 
to  seventy  cents  a  day  in  the  longest  days  of  summer.  Tester 
day  I  visited  that  farm.  I  asked  the  men  who  were  there  what 
they  paid  men  in  haying-time  last  summer,  and  they  said  from 
two  dollars  to  two  and  a  half  a  day.  This  was  paid  on  the  .same 
ground  where  men  worked  forty  years  ago  for  from  fifty  cents  to 
four  shillings,  and  took  their  pay  in  farm  products,  not  money. 
I  have  seen  some  of  the  brightest  women  go  into  the  farm  houses 
and  work  for  from  fifty  to  seventy-five  cents  a  week,  milking  the 
cows,  making  butter  and  cheese,  washing,  spinning,  and  weav- 
ing— doing  all  kinds  of  hard  work.  I  was  told  yesterday  that 
many  young  women  were  earning  in  the  shops  a  dollar  a  day,  and 
that  those  who  worked  in  houses  were  getting  from  two  dollars 
and  a  half  a  week  to  three  dollars  and  a  half." 

The  building  up  of  liome  manufactures  and  of  rail- 
roads necessary  for  the  factories  and  mills,  has  lifted  the 
American  farmer  out  of  this  poor  condition,  and  he  is 
better  off  than  the  tiller  of  the  soil  in  any  other  country. 

WISE     INDUSTRIAL     POLICY     NEEDED     FOR     SUCCESS     IN 
FARMING. 

Our  breadth  of  rich  soil,  the  new  wealth  of  precious 
metals,  and  the  superior  skill  and  industry  of  our  people 
doubtless  helped  this  great  change  ;  but  a  wise  national 
industrial  policy  was  an  important  element,  without 
which  it  would  never  have  been  made.  Soil  and  climate 
were  the  same  in  those  days  of  the  poverty  of  our  farm- 
ers as  now.  I  can  well  remember  the  plain  and  careful 
living  of  the  New  England  farmers  in  my  youth,  and 
now  see  their  children  still  industrious  and  thrifty  like 
their  parents,  but  able  to  live  and  to  dress  in  a  style  that 
would  have  astonished  those  worthy  ancestors. 

My  mother  used  to  tell  how  her  father,  a  farmer  in 
Massachusetts,  had  the  only  chaise   in  town,  a,nd  iiow 


Protection  and  the  FarTners.  103 

they  rode  to  meeting  on  Sundays  proudly  pre-eminent 
among  the  plain  wagons  of  their  neighbors.  Around 
that  same  country  meeting-house,  on  a  Sunday  now,  can 
be  seen  scores  of  fine  carriages  ;  and  tlie  change  in  dress 
is  as  marked  us  that  in  these  conveyances. 

Turkey  has  an  ample  space  of  fine  land,  and  a  climate 
favorable  to  good  farming,  Cuba  has  a  soil  of  wonder- 
ful fertility ;  yet  the  people  of  both  these  countries  are 
miserable. 

The  union  of  Ireland  with  England,  by  admitting 
English  goods  free  of  tariffs,  broke  down  Irish  manu- 
factures, turned  her  people  into  poor  farmers,  brought 
on  the  potato  rot,  and  famine  swept  down  over  two 
millions  of  her  population. 

A  century  ago  not  only  did  the  native  hand-looms  of 
Hindostan  weave  the  finest  cottons  and  woolens  or  cash- 
meres, but  the  richest  silks,  such  as  for  centnries  had 
been  carried  across  the  deserts  of  Central  Asia  on 
camels  to  Europe.  But  free  trade  was  carried  into  India 
at  the  point  of  England's  bayonets,  and  with  it  came 
the  destruction  of  manufactures,  and  the  turning  out  of 
employment  of  millions  of  laborers.  Theoretically  they 
were  free  to  buy  in  the  cheapest  market  and  sell  in  the 
dearest ;  but,  in  fact,  they  could  sell  nothing  and  buy 
nothing.  Weavers  could  not  sell  their  cloths  because 
the  English  undersold  them.  The  English  would  not 
allow  their  machinery  to  go  to  India.  Those  who  made 
their  cloths  in  England  did  not  buy  their  crops.  Hence 
the  poor  Hindoos  had  no  resource  but  to  starve  and  die 
by  millions,  by  the  roadsides  and  in  the  fields.  Famines 
prevailed  periodically,  as  many  as  two  millions  of  per- 
sons dying  in  a  single  year. 

These  countries  have  rich  soil  and  fine  climate,  but  a 


104 


Protection  and  the  Farmers. 


bad  indtistrial  policy  has  wrought  sore  disaster  m  their 
midst.  Hindostan  is  now  a  part  and  province  of  the 
British  Empire,  and  asks  for  a  protective  tariff  to  giiurd 
herself  against  English  monopoly  of  her  manufactures, 
hut  asks  in  vain, 

RICH   LAND    EXHAUSTED. 

For  forty  years  the  rich  valley  of  the  Wabash,  in  west- 
ern Indiana,  exported  its  great  corn  crops  to  "New 
Orleans, — took  all  from  the  soil  and  put  nothing  back. 
That  soil  seemed  inexhaustible,  and  yielded  its  eighty 
bushels  per  acre;  but  its  decay  came.  A  few  years  ago 
a  large  land  owner  told  me  that  his  average  product 
had  come  down  to  thirty-five  bushels. 

Build  the  factory  near  the  farm  and  a  large  share  of 
what  is  taken  away  can  be  put  back. 

FARM    AND    FACTORY    NEIGHBORS   AND   ALLIES. 

The  following  table  (from  official  reports)  shows  the 
benefit  of  making  farm  and  factory  neighbors  : 


Average  product 

per  acre. 

Bushels. 

Corn. 

Wlieat. 

3.5 

15.2 

37.5 

17  5 

:>9 

16.8 

40.7 

17 

a5,G 

17 

.38 

10.4 

3.J 

13.2 

29.3 

10 

34 

11  2 

40  C 

15 

Cash  Value 

of  principal 

crop.s  per 

acre. 


Six  New  England  States 

Ohio 

Indiana.., 

Michigan  .       ...     

Average  of  these  three  Western  man- 1 

ufacturlng  and  farming  States ....  .  ) 

Iowa 

Minnesota  

Kansas  ..... 

Average  of  these  tliree  farming  States,  j^ 

witli  fewer  factories ) 

Pennsylvania 


$16  .52 
16  60 
13  82 
16  % 

15  79 

9  W 
11  54 
7  98 

9  62 

$17  33 


Protection  mid  the  Farmers.  105 

Of  course  the  area  of  tillable  land  is  much  larger  in 
the  West  than  in  New  England,  l)ut  some  Western 
farmers  will  be  surprised  to  find  the  grain  products  per  acre 
in  tlie  East  larger  than  in  Iowa.  The  cash  value  is  still 
more  in  favor  of  the  States,  East  and  West,  where  manu- 
factures are  most  widely  spread.  Michigan  leads  the 
West  in  products  and  value,  and  her  home  market  is 
large  among  lumbermen  and  miners. 

Pennsylvania  leads  all,  and  tliis  because  she  has  a 
broad  extent  of  good  farming  lands  with  great  mills  and 
factories  near  at  hand. 

The  lesson  is  plain.     We  cann^ot  have  the    best 

FARMING  UXTIL   WE    HAVE    THE    BEST    MANUFACTURIXG 
BESIDE  THE  FARM. 

Dr.  Peter  Collier,  the  able  chemist  of  the  Agricultural 
Department  at  Washington,  publishes  a  table  of  average 
crops  of  corn,  wheat,  potatoes  and  hay  in  31  States  for 
1862-70  and  for  1871-80,  and  other  facts  to  make  his 
statement  more  clear.  He  concludes  that,  on  the  whole; 
there  has  been  a  decrease  of  productiveness  in  the  last  20 
years,  and  tliat  the  increase  has  been  in  regions  where 
fei-tilizers  are  most  used, — in  New  England  and  tlie  Mid- 
dle States.  In  this  older  part  of  our  country,  where  land 
has  ])een  long  cultivated,  farms  yield  larger  crops  than 
in  the  West,  and  their  yield  improves.  These  farms 
are  near  the  best  and  most  varied  manufaclures. 

FARM   AVAGES   HERE   AND    IX    ENGLAND. 

The  Department  of  Agriculture  at  Washington  has 
issued  a  report  on  the  wages  of  farm  labor,  from  which 
an  extract  plainly  shows  the  larger  Avagcs  and  wealth  of 
farmers  in  manufacturing  regions.  Those  more  dis- 
tant share  these  benefits,  but  in  less  degree: 


106  Protection  and  the  Funners. 

"The  influence  of  manufactures  upon  agriculture  is  seen  in  tlie 
wages  of  farm  labor  as  well  as  in  the  prices  of  farm  production. 
The  rate  is  higher  in  Massachusetts  than  in  any  other  State  east 
of  the  Rocky  Mountains.  It  is  seen  in  the  West  as  well,  affecting 
the  averages  of  States  lying  side  by  side.  Ohio  has  become  a 
manufacturing  state  of  considerable  importance.  It  is  dotted  over 
with  cities  of  20,000  to  60,000  people,  largely  interested  in  manufact- 
uring industry.  Kentuckj',  on  the  other  bank  of  the  Ohio,  is  occupied 
mainly  with  the  pursuits  of  agriculture.  This  fact,  together  w^itli 
the  larger  proportion  of  negro  labor,  reduces  the  rate  of  wages. 
The  comparison  (in  1882)  is  as  follow^s:  Ohio  $24.55  per  month 
and  Kentucky  $18.20. 

"  In  population,  variety  of  industry,  and  general  industrial 
advancement  the  northern  district  of  Illinois  surpa.sses  the  southern. 
Naturally  the  wages  of  agricultural  labor  reflect  this  difference. 
Dividing  the  State  on  the  line  of  comities  reaching  below  the  41.st 
parallel,  and  again  on  the  line  of  the  29th  parallel,  the  average 
wages  are  respectively,  from  north  to  south,  as  follows  : 

Per  month. 

Northern  district |27  52 

Central  district 24  05 

Southern  district 19  87 

********* 

"Wlienever  other  industries  flourish,  and  the  number  of  per- 
sons employed  in  agriculture  is  fewer  than  those  engaged  in  other 
occupations,  it  is  found  that  the  prices  of  farm  products  are  also 
higher  in  manufacturing  districts,  and  the  gross  and  net  earnings, 
of  the  farm  proprietor  greater." 

The  Mark  Lane  Express  (England)  has  a  tabular  state- 
ment of  wages  of  farm  laborers  in  England  and  Wales, 
From  sixty-seven  districts  the  range  is  from  $125  to 
$270  per  year — without  board.  In  one  ease  it  reaches. 
$295.  Sometimes  there  are  perquisites  of  beer  or  milk, 
coal  or  a  cottage  at  low  rent,  all  from  a  few  shilhng  up 
to  a  few  dollars.  The  average  gross  income  of  the 
English  farm  hand,  as  these  statements  make  it,  would 
not  be  over  $180  per  year,  with  which  to  board  and 


Protection  and  the  Faj'mers. 


lor 


clothe  himself  and  his  family.  Our  farmers — *'  robbed 
by  protected  monopolists  " — pay  from  1200  to  |?250  per 
year  and  board,  for  like  labor ;  and  pay  most  where 
these  robbers  are  most  plenty — in  Massachusetts,  for 
instance. 

PURCHASING    POWER   OF   THE    FARMER — A    COMPARISON. 

The  average  prices  of  seven  leading  farm-products, 
and  of  seven  leading  manufactui'ed  articles  on  the  imports 
of  which  duties  are  levied,  for  five  free  trade  or  revenue 
tariff  years,  and  for  five  protective  tariff  years  are  given 
in  the  following  tables,  prepared  by  Hon.  Jonathan 
Chase,  M.  C,  of  Rhode  Island.  He  took  his  prices  from 
a  report  of  Hon.  Mr.  Burchard,  of  Illinois  (a  free 
trader),  from  the  New  York  Journal  of  Commerce  (free 
trade),  and  from  the  Philadelphia  prices  current  of  iron: 

"Let  us  see  what  the  farmer's  articles  would  buy  in  the  market: 
Table  No.  1. 


Average  prices  in 
five  Free  Trade 
years  ending  in 
1850. 


Average  prices  in 
five  Protective 
Tariff  years 
ending  in  1880. 


Wheat,  bush 

Com,  bush 

Oats,  bush 

Butter,  lb. . .  

Kentucky  tobacco,  lb . . 

Wool,  lb 

Cheese,  lb 

Coal,  ton 

Liverpool  salt,  sack 

Bleached  Sheeting,  yard 

Prints,  yard 

No.  1  pig-iron,  ton 

Refined  bar  iron,  ton 

Railroad  iron,  ton 


$1  22.8 
64.4 
42.3 
15 

5.82 
35.58 
6.3 
5  63 
1  34.8 
14.43 
10.05 
25  65 
76  82 
58  27 


$1  30.2 
52.9 
38.72 
24.68 
8.48 
44.74 
9.94 
3  62.3 
72.22 
11.78 
7.95 
21  75 
50  82 
40  15 


108 


Protection  and  the  Fanners. 


Table  No.  2. 


One  bushel  of  wheat 
would  buy — 

Under  Free  Trade 

"Under  Protection 

One    bushel    of    corn 
would  buy — 

Under  Free  Trade 

Under  Protection 

One  bushel    of     oats 
wounl  buy— 

Under  Free  Trade 

Under  Protection 

Ten  pounds  of  butter 
woi.1.1  biiy — 

Under  Free  Trade 

Under  Protection 

Ten  pounils  of  cheese 
would  buy  — 

Under  Free  Trade . 

Under  Protection 

On'^   pound    of    wool 
would  buy  — 

Under  Free  Traile 

Under  Protection 

Ten  pounds  of  Kentucky 
tooacco  would  buy — 

Under  Free  Trade 

Under  Protection 


Is 

"3 
o 
O 

1^ 

S7i 

05 

a 

g 

d 
o 

u 

m 

Sacks. 

LI'S. 

Yds. 

Yds. 

Lbs. 

Lbs. 

.91 

432 

8.51 

12.21 

107.3 

35.8 

1.80 

710 

11.04 

16.27 

l:}4.00 

57.  a5 

.47 

2.5{). 

4.46 

6.4 

56.34 

i8.';s 

.73 

328. 

4.49 

6.65 

54.49 

33.32 

.31 

16S. 

2.93 

4.20 

36.94 

12. ;« 

.536 

240. 

3.27 

4.89 

39.87 

17.07 

1.113 

597. 

10.39 

14.92 

131 

43.74 

3.417 

15;m 

20.95 

31.04 

2.54 

108.82 

.474 

250. 

4.36 

6.28 

55.02 

18.37 

1.37G 

019 

8.4;5 

12.52 

102.36 

43.83 

.204 

141. 

2.46 

3.54 

31.06 

10.37 

.601 

296. 

4.05 

6.00 

49.16 

21.  (>4 

.431 

231. 

4.03 

5.79 

50.82 

16.97 

1.117 

526. 

7.19 

10.66 

87.33 

37.38 

%i 


Lbs. 


34.76 

29.55 


16.26 
21.63 


57.69 
137.87 


24.23 
50.53 


13.68 
21.08 


23.34 

47.37 


"  While  the  price  of  corn  is  comparatively  lower  than  that  of 
■any  agricultural  product,  still  the  farmer  can  produce  it  relatively 
cheaper,  and  lie  can  land  it  cheaper  at  tide-water  market. 

"  But  let  me  proceed  with  the  table:  Under  fi-ee  trade  the 
farmer  could  buy  with  one  bushel  of  wheat  .91  of  a  sack  of  Liver- 
pool salt;  mider  protection  it  would  buy  1.8  sacks.  Under  free 
trade  the  bushel  of  wheat  would  buy  8.51  yards  of  bleached  sheet- 
ing; luider  protection  11.04  yards.  Under  free  trade  it  would  buy 
422  pounds  of  coal;  and  under  protection  719  pounds.     Under  free 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  109 

trade  it  would  buy  13.31  yards  of  prints;  under  protection  16.27 
yards.  Under  free  trade  it  would  buy  107.3  pounds  of  pig-iron; 
under  protection  134  pounds.  Under  free  trade,  35.8  pounds  of 
bar-iron;  and  under  protection  57.35.  Under  free  trade  it  would 
buy  47.23  pounds  of  railroad  iron;  under  protection  73.6  pounds. 

CHEAP   TRANSPORTATIOlSr. 

The  total  product  of  iron  and  steel  of  all  kinds  in  the 
Western  States  in  1880  was  1,912,689  tons,  valued  at 
$76,933,686.  (See  U.  S.  census.)  This  required  the 
transportation  of  8,000,000  tons  of  raw  materials — ore, 
coal,,  limestone,  etc. — equal  in  weight  to  264,000,000 
bushels  of  wheat,  or  three-fourths  of  the  total  crop  of  those 
States.  Tlie  more  freight  the  lower  rates  of  transporta- 
tion, by  rail  and  water.  The  census  reports  the  freights 
on  wheat  from  Chicago  to  New  York,  all  rail  the  whole 
year,  at  42|  cents  per  bushel  in  1868,  and  19^  cents  in 
1880,  and  a  corres})onding  reduction  Ijy  rail  and  water. 

The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  in  London,  tells  the  English 
people  that  railroad  freights  are  lower  per  mile  in  this 
country  than  in  England,  and  that  they  have  fallen  45 
to  60  per  cent,  from  1868  to  1878.  Mr.  H.  V.  Poor, 
tlie  great  railroad  authority,  stated  to  the  Bureau  of 
Statistics  at  Washington  that  in  1860  the  working  man 
in  New  York  City  paid  11.60  for  the  freight  of  his 
barrel  of  flour  from  Chicago,  in  1880  he  paid  only  86 
cents.  Edward  Atkinson,  of  Boston,  shows  that  the 
freight  from  Chicago  to  Boston  of  grain  and  meat  for  a 
year's  food  for  a  man  costs  but  %\.  25,  or  a  day's  work. 
Thirteen  leading  raih'oads,  most  of  them  in  the  West, 
reduced  their  charge  per  ton  ])er  mile,  from  Ij-Vo"  cents 
in  1873  to  ly^  cents  in  1880,  or  38  per  cent.  For  these 
reductions  there  are  two  leading  causes, — the  larger 
manufacture  of  rails  at  liome.  and  in  the  West  especially; 


110  Protection  and  the  Farmers. 

tlie  immense  addition  to  grain  freights  of  freight  of  these 
millions  of  tons  of  material  for  iron  and  other  manufac- 
tures. 

The  annual  report  of  the  Milwaukee  and  St.  Paul  rail- 
way shows  that  in  the  17  years  since  1865  the  average 
rate  per  ton  per  mile  for  freight  over  its  line  has  heen 
reduced  from  4. 11  cents  to  1. 70  cents.  Competition  and 
improved  facilities  have  made  the  reduction  without  the 
aid  of  legislation. 

Tlie  farmer  gets  a  large  share  of  this  benefit.  Close 
these  western  iron  mills  and  his  grain  freights  would 
rise:  build  up  manufactures  at  many  points  and  local 
freights  will  fall,  as  through  freights  have. 

The  report  of  the  United  States  Railroad  Commis- 
sioner for  1883  says  :  ''The  United  States  enjoys  the 
cheapest  railroad  transportation  in  the  world." 

ADDRESS    OF    E.    B.    WARD    AT    WISCONSIN    STATE     FAIR. 

In  1868  the  State  Agricultural  Society  of  Wisconsin 
iuAdted  E.  B.  Ward,  of  Detroit,  Michigan,  to  give  the 
address  at  its  State  Fair  at  Madison.  Mr.  Ward  was  a 
man  of  broad  views  and  large  experience,  who  had  done 
much,  not  only  as  a  manufacturer  but  as  a  manager  of 
lands  and  farms,  for  Western  industry.  He  seldom 
spoke  to  public  audiences,  and  only  wrote,  with  a  terse 
brevity,  occasional  articles  which  were  widely  read. 
Some  extracts  from  his  address  will  give  light  on  this 
question  : 

"  It  is  folly  for  one  class  to  try  to  stand  alone,  or  to  look  upon 
othei-s  with  jealousy.  We  depend  on  each  other.  Farms  or  fac- 
tories only  thrive  best  when  they  are  near  each  other,  so  that  they 
can  help  each  other  easier.  England  has  no  room  for  farming,  as 
we  have,  and  while  her  niannfacturing  puts  great  wealth  in  a  few 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  Ill 

hands,  her  landless  people  are  poor.  Here  there  is  room  for 
homes  and  farms  for  an  independent  people.  Here  are  metals, 
fuel,  food,  and  raw  materials  for  textile  fabrics  in  abundance. 

-St******** 

"Our  distinguished  political  economist,  Henry  C.  Carey,  well 
known  on  both  continents,  and  whose  masterly  writings  should  be 
in  every  home  library  and  in  every  school,  well  says  : 

"  '  Steadiness  and  regularity  in  the  returns  to  agricultural  labor 
grow  with  increase  in  the  variety  of  commodities  produced  in  the 
land.  Disease  tends  to  disappear  as  population  increases  and  a 
near  market  is  created.  The  poor  Irishman  sees  his  potatoes 
perish  of  rot,  consequent  on  the  increasing  exhaustion  of  soil;  the 
Portuguese  witnesses  his  hopes  destroyed  by  the  vine  disease;  the 
American  farmer  is  visited  by  blight,  resiUting  from  taking  from 
the  soil  the  material  for  the  ever-Yecurring  wheat  crop.  The  man 
who  has  a  market  at  his  door  finds  blight  and  insects  vanish,  and 
is  able  to  make  his  crops  more  certain.' 
********* 

"  Capital  likes  good  investments  and  quick  returns,  yet  it  can 
live,  and  wait,  and  take  advantage  of  poverty.  Labor  wants  con- 
stant and  decently  paid  occupation.  Diversified  industry  is  desir- 
able to  the  capitalist,  but  far  more  so,  and  more  nece.ssary  to  the 
workman.  If  I  had  a  million  dollars  it  would  need  no  great  wit 
to  go  into  a  region  where  cash  was  scarce,  because  the  people  were 
far  from  market,  loan  money  to  farmers,  and  swallow  up  their 
farms,  according  to  law,  if  not  according  to  gospel,  by  relentless 
foreclosvire  of  mortgages.  But  suppose  I  invested  the  million  in 
woolen,  or  cotton,  or  iron  mills,  bought  the  products  of  those  farms 
for  the  workmen,  and  employed  the  surplus  laborers;  there  need 
be  no  mortgages,  but  the  lands  would  rise  five  or  ten  fold  in  value. 

"I  should  not  be  acting  as  a  philanthropist,  but  simply  as  a  busi- 
ness man,  helping  others  to  prosper  that  I  might  share  in  that 
prosperity. 

"Let  the  blood  stagnate  or  move  too  slow  in  the  veins  and  a 
man  is  sick — the  strong  and  ready  pulsation  is  health.  So  with 
business;  it  is  rapid  and  easy  circulation  of  money,  quick  returns, 
nearness  of  producer  and  consumer,  demand  for  labor  of  all  kinds, 
and  sale  and  interchange  of  its  products,  that  makes  health  and 
brings  wealth. 


112  Protection,  and  the  Farmers. 

' '  Wherever  a  large  center  of  consumption  is  formed,  tlie  neigh- 
boring farmers  are  tlie  lirst  to  protit  by  it.  This  law  is  infallible, 
and  allows  of  no  exception. 

"  Shall  the  hum  of  the  spindle,  the  roar  of  the  waterfall,  the  puff 
of  the  engine,  and  the  clang  of  the  triphammer  cease  in  your  bor- 
ders, that  England  may  find  market  for  her  wares,  while  you  keep 
on  being  'the  world's  granary'  until  your  land  is  too  poor  ta 
raise  wheat? 

"Agriculture   and  manufactures  are    the   creators   of    useful 
materials  and  finished  products.     Commerce  only  transports  and 
exchanges  what  they  bring  into  being.    Neither  can  thrive  without 
the  other,  and  neither  can  gain  by  overreaching  the  other. 
***  ****** 

"  Protection  to  home  industry  is  the  business  of  a  good  govern- 
ment, and  its  advocacy  the  duty  of  theintelligent  and  enlightened 
citizen.  Not  monopoly  for  the  benefit  of  any  one  class,  but  pro- 
tection to  that  degree  needed  to  encourage  manufactures  and  bene- 
fit farmers,  and  keep  our  balance  of  trade  healthy.  You  do  not 
need  a  tariff  on  wheat  to  prevent  its  import  from  Europe,  for  the 
freight  is  a  tariff  ;  but  a  roll  of  English  or  German  cloth  is  a  car- 
load of  foreign  corn,  packed  in  small  compass,  and  if  you  buy  it 
you  help  to  keep  down  the  j^rice  of  your  grain  to  its  level. 
********* 

' '  That  well-known  philanthropist,  Peter  Cooper,  of  New  York, 
has  carefully  prepared  a  table,  from  the  Treasury  Reports  of  1856 
and  1857,  showing  the  production  for  each  man,  woman  and 
child,  white  or  black,  in  the  State,  which  shows  the  great  advan- 
tage of  the  manufacturing  States.    I  give  a  part  of  it  to  illustrate  : 

Massachusetts $166  60 

Wisconsin 68  41 

Rhode  Island 164  61 

Indiana 99  13 

Connecticut 156  05 

California  (gold  included) 149  96 

' '  Move  on  in  Wisconsin  and  you  can  overtop  Massachusetts, 
but  you  must  move  in  that  path.  You  see  the  'Yankee  notions' 
of  Connecticut  are  worth  more  than  the  gold  nuggets  of  Cali- 
fornia, and  may  learn  that  the  iron  mines  and  fleeces  in  your 
midst  can  be  made  of  more  value  than  richest  gold  beds. 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  113 

"  I  have  nothing  to  say  about  motives  or  intentions,  but,  in  fact, 

the  man  who  advocates  and  supports  what  is  called  '  free  trade ' 

is  an  enemy  to  our  country's  good,  and  especially  to  the  good  of 

the  Northwest. 
********* 

"I  do  not  feel  like  a  stranger  among  you.  Coming  to  this 
Western  country  fort}^  years  ago,  in  my  boyhood  and  youth  I 
shared  the  toils  and  privations  of  our  pioneer  life.  I  have  rolled 
and  b\irnt  logs,  and  plowed  and  planted,  and  hoed  and  harvested, 
amidst  stumps  and  girdled  trees,  with  the  forests  all  around  the 
clearings. 

"I  have  sailed  along  the  shores  of  your  then  new  territory, 
landing  at  Milwaukee,  when  a  few  rude  cabins  were  the  pitiful 
beginnings  of  what  is  now  a  large  and  beautiful  city.  I  landed 
flour  in  a  small  boat,  lying  off  the  mouth  of  Chicago  river,  when 
there  was  only  a  few  houses,  a  ruinous  warehouse,  an  old  fort, 
and  a  miserable  so-called  hotel,  on  the  open  prairie  where  now 
rises  another  great  city,  and  have  always  been  glad  of  these  my 
toils  and  trials,  since  they  earned  me  the  privilege  of  appreciat- 
ing the  laborious  life  of  the  pioneer." 

COMPARISON    A]SrD    COifTRAST — ^THE     WESTERN"     PROTEC- 
TIONIST  AND   THE   COBDEN   CLUB     SPOKESMAN. 

These  quotations  from  the  address  of  Mr.  "Ward  give 
honest  facts  not  capalile  of  refutation,  and  tlie  frankly 
spoken  opinions  of  an  able  Western  man,  wliose  inter- 
ests were  identified,  in  liis  own  mind,  with  those  of 
the  people  he  addressed.  Compare  tliem  with  the  mis- 
statements of  the  Coljdeti  Club,  througli  Mongredien, 
their  endorsed  spokesman,  and  see  wliieh  has  tlie  true 
ring.  As  a  means  of  making  this  comparison  an  extract 
from  a  review  of  the  Mongredien  tract  by  Hon.  Tliomas 
H.  Dudley,  of  Camden,  New  Jersey,  late  U.  S.  consul 
at  Liverpool,  may  help  us.  The  extract  covers  but  a 
l)art,  but  his  review  meets  and  refutes  all  the  rest  with 
equal  force.  Mr.  Dudley  opens  by  addressing  the  Eng- 
lish writer  as  follows  : 


114  Protection  and  the  Farmers. 

' '  I  visited  Europe  some  few  weeks  ago,  and,  a  day  or  two 
before  I  left,  j^our  pamphlet,  issued  under  the  auspices  of  the  Cob- 
den  Club,  and  addressed  to  the  Western  farmers  of  America,  was 
placed  in  my  hands.  I  was  aware  that  great  efforts  were  to  be 
made  by  the  English  people  to  repeal  our  Tariff  system,  and  in  this 
way  break  down  our  manufactures,  but  I  did  not  suppose  that 
England,  or  the  Cobden  Club,  would  openly  make  an  attempt  to 
control  our  elections,  even  to  accomplish  this  object ;  but  it  seems 
I  was  mistaken,  and  it  is  reserved  for  you  to  make  an  open 
attempt,  the  first  I  have  seen.  It  is  a  bold  move  on  your  part,  but 
the  stake  you  are  playing  for  is  an  important  one  for  England,  and 
I  suppose  you  think  the  end  justifies  the  means.  The  first  and 
primary  object  of  your  book  is  to  show  the  farmers  in  the  United 
States  how  badly  they  are  treated  by  their  own  government;  how 
grossly  they  are  robbed  and  swindled,  and  in  this  way  to  prepare 
them  or  induce  them  to  vote  at  the  elections  for  certain  candidates 
with  the  view  of  redressing  these  wrongs  and  grievances,  but  in 
reality  to  break  down  our  manufactures  and  transfer  the  business 
of  this  country  to  England. 

THE    NUMBER   OF    FARMERS    IN    THE   mSTITED  STATES   MISSTATED. 

"I  propose  to  examine  your  book  and  compare  it  with  the  fact.s. 
You  state  that  the  census  of  1870  shows  5,922,000  persons  engaged 
in  agricidture,  and  you  take  this  for  your  basis,  and  a.ssume  that 
from  this  there  must  now  be  not  less  than  seven  millions  of  per- 
sons so  engaged,  '  nearly  all  of  them  having  wives  and  children ;' 
and  then  you  ask  what  are  the  annual  expenditures  on  all  arti- 
cles of  consiunption,  except  food  and  drink,  of  each  of  these 
'families,'  and  you  fix  the  annual  expenditures  of  each  at  two 
hundred  dollars.  You  then,  after  computing  the  number  of 
persons  so  engaged  to  be  seven  millions,  nearly  all  of  whom 
have  families,  and  assuming  two  hundred  dollars  per  annum  as 
the  amount  expended  by  each  of  such  persons  so  engaged  as 
have  families,  proceed  and  multiply  the  whole  of  the  seven  mil- 
lions by  the  two  hundred  dollars,  without  making  a  single  excep- 
tion for  those  who  have  no  families;  charging  every  man,  woman, 
and  child  with  con.o;iming  or  using  annually  two  hundred  dollars' 
worth  of  products,  besides  their  fond  and  drink.  Now,  by  the 
census  of  1870  there  were  only  2,659,985  farms  in   the  whole 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  116 

country,  and  very  nearly  half  a  million  of  these  were  under  twenty 
acres.  Accordinrj  to  your  calculation  there  must  have  been  a  little  less 
than  three  farmers  with  their  families  running  each  farm  in  the 
United  States.  You  ought  to  have  mentioned  this  fact.  Our 
farmers  generally  think  they  run  their  own  farms,  and  it  would 
have  been  quite  as  astonishing  to  them  as  most  of  the  other  things 
in  your  book.  You  found  by  our  census  in  1870  there  were 
5,922,471  persons  engaged  in  agi'icultural  pursuits.  Do  you  not 
think  it  would  have  been  just  as  well  for  you,  and  more  just  to 
your  readers,  to  have  told  them  that  of  this  number  there  were 
396,968  females,  nearly  all  in  the  Southern  States,  and  colored 
women,  who  in  the  days  of  slavery  had  been  compelled  to  work  as 
field-hands,  and  that  there  were  739,164  chiklren  under  fifteen 
years  of  age,  not  one-tenth  of  whom,  including  the  women,  prob- 
ably ever  earned  so  much  as  one  hundred  dollars  in  a  year,  and 
the  average  wages  of  the  other  nine-tenths  probably  would  not 
amount  to  fifty  dollars  a  year?  This,  of  course,  would  have 
spoiled  your  figuring  a  little,  but  it  would  have  been  more  just  to 
your  readers. 

THE  FARMER  PROTECTED  BY  OUR  TARIFF. 

"Having  taken  a  look  at  your  figures,  and  seen  on  what  bas\j 
you  rest  your  book,  we  will  take  another  step  in  its  examinstio/< 

"1.  You  state  that  the  Western  farmer  neither  receive/j  ii(n 
seeks  any  legislative  protection ; 

"2.  That  the  farmer  in  America  sells  in  the  cheapest  and  buyA 
in  the  dearest  markets,  and  for  what  he  raises  begets  a  lower  pvice 
and  for  what  he  consumes  he  pays  a  higher  price  than  the  kvad- 
tillers  get  and  pay  in  any  other  country  in  the  world; 

' '  3.  That  by  reason  of  our  tariff  laws  the  farmers  have  to  pay 
the  manufacturers  in  Eastern  States  four  hundi-ed  millions  of  dol- 
lars ever  year  more  than  they  would  have  to  pay  the  English 
people  for  the  same  goods  if  they  were  permitted  to  buy  them  in 
England  and  import  them  free  of  duty ;  that  for  what  they  now 
have  to  pay  one  hundred  and  forty  dollars  they  could  buy  of  a 
Biitisher  for  one  himdred  dollars,  and  tliat  this  vast  sum  of  money, 
to  wit,  four  hundred  millions  of  dollars,  year  after  year,  is  un- 
necessarily and  wantonly  thrown  away  and  wasted,  without  the 
least  benefit  to  anvbodv.     You  make  all  these  statements  without 


116  Protection  and  the  Farmers. 

reservation  or  exception,  unless  it  be  some  sixty  millions  of  dollars 
which  i^ossiblj^  may  go  to  the  legitimate  purpose  of  national  rev- 
enue. 

"Are  these  statements  true  or  are  they  false? 

"Let  us  examine  them,  and  first  that  '  the  western  farmer  neither 
receives  nor  seeks  any  legislative  protection.'  If  the  farmei' 
receives  protection  whether  he  a.sks  for  it  or  not,  your  statement 
is  untrue.  Is  it  possible  that  you  were  so  ignorant,  or  were  the 
facts  concealed  on  purpose  to  misrepresent  and  deceive? 

"  You  admit  that  rice  is  protected  to  ninety-three  per  cent. 

"  The  duty  on  wheat  is  twenty  cents  per  bushel,  on  Indian  com 
or  maize,  ten  cents,  and  other  grains,  dairy  products,  meats,  wool 
and  sugar  pay  duties  when  imported. 

"  These  duties  were  imposed  to  protect  the  farmers,  those  in  the 
west  as  well  as  those  in  the  east.  There  is  no  interest  in  the  country 
more  thoroughly  protected. 

"In  addition  to  the  direct  protection  our  farmers  receive,  under 
our  present  tariff  sj'stem,  the  incidental  protection  which  they 
receive  by  the  creation  of  a  home  market  is  even  greater  and  far 
more  important.  The  direct  protection  keeps  off  competitors,  and 
the  incidental  establishes  for  them  a  certain,  constant,  and  reliable 
home  market.  Leaving  out  cotton  and  tobacco,  it  is  found  that 
about  ninety-two  per  cent  of  the  surplus  products  of  the  farmers 
of  the  United  States  are  consumed  at  home,  and  principally  by 
our  Eastern  manufacturers  and  those  connected  with  them,  while 
only  eight  per  cent,  are  sent  abroad.  These  are  about  the  propor- 
tions, one  year  with  another.  Destroy  the  manufactures  and  you 
destroy  this  home  market;  the  market  destroyed,  and  where  will 
the  farmer  sell  his  surplus  ?  You  will  answer,  in  England.  My 
reply  is  that  England  will  take  just  what  she  requires  and  no 
more.  England  never  has  taken,  and  never  will  take,  the  place  of 
the  home  market.  Hence  this  home  market  to  our  farmers,  both. 
East  and  West,  is  of  the  greatest  importance. 

THE  MARKET   IN  WHICH  THE  FARMER  BUYS   WHAT  HE   CONSUMES. 

"  Is  your  assertion,  that  for  what  he  consumes  he  pays  more 
than  the  land-tiller  in  any  other  country,  true  or  false  ? 

"As  to  food,  including  breadstuffs,  meat,  butter,  cheese,  lard, 
eggs,  poultry,  fruits,  potatoes,  and  other  vegetables,  you  seem  to 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  117 

■concede  that  they  are  cheaper  here  than  they  are  in  England,  there- 
fore that  they  cost  less,  and  you  leave  them  out.  But  you  take 
principally  manufactured  commodities,  and  you  rest  your  case 
upon  these.  You  are  careful  not  to  mention  tea  and  coffee,  both 
of  which  are  sold  cheaper  in  our  country  than  they  are  in  England, 
because  we  impose  no  revenue  duty  upon  them  and  you  do.  You 
are  good  enough  to  give  us  a  list  of  some  of  the  goods  manufact- 
ured in  the  Ea.stern  States  which  the  Western  fai-mer  consumes, 
and  for  which  you  assert  positively  that  he  pays  forty  dollars  more 
on  a  hundred  than  he  could  buy  them  for  in  England  if  it  was  not 
for  our  terrible  protective  tariff.  Your  contention,  in  substance, 
is  that  these  goods  are  now  selling  for  forty  per  cent,  cheaper  in 
England  than  similar  kinds  and  quantities  can  be  bought  for  in  the 
States.  Being  in  England  at  the  time  this  pamphlet  was  placed  in 
my  hands,  and  having  had  some  knowledge  and  experience  in 
your  prices  and  mode  of  doing  business  from  my  residence  of 
eleven  years  among  you,  I  set  myself  at  work  to  ascertain  the 
retail  price  of  some  of  these  commodities,  in  order  to  compare 
them  with  the  price  at  the  retail  stores  in  America.  I  took  the 
retail  price  because  the  farmer  generally  buys  at  retail  stores. 

"  Of  the  textile  fabrics  consumed  or  used  by  our  farmers,  none 
are  so  much  used  as  cotton  fabrics.  For  the  last  five  years  we 
have  been  continuously  shipping  our  cotton  goods  to  England, 
but,  for  your  oioi  purposes,  you  ignore  the  fact  that  cotton  goods  are 
cheaper  in  the  United  States  than  m  England.  If  you  will  put 
yourself  to  the  trouble  to  go  to  your  own  dry  goods  stores  in  Eng- 
land, you  will  find  on  their  shelves  our  cotton  fabrics  for  .sale,  and 
at  prices  as  cheap  as.  if  not  cheaper  than,  you  can  manufacture 
and  sell  them  for.  Your  statement,  then,  about  the  farmer's  wife 
being  able  to  buy  a  calico  dress  in  England  for  two  dollars,  for 
which  she  now  has  to  pay  three  dollars  in  America,  is  untrue. 
And  this  applies  to  hosiery  as  well  as  to  prints  and  plain  cotton 
goods.  It  is  the  same  with  boots  and  shoes.  If  you  will  take  tlie 
trouble  to  examine  your  own  trade  returns,  printed  by  order  of  Par- 
liament, you  will  find  that  you  have  been  importing  boots  and  shoes 
from  the  United  States,  and  if  you  will  go  still  farther,  and  do  as  I 
have  done,  go  to  your  stores  in  England  and  then  to  our  stores  in 
this  countr}%  you  will  find  that  the  farmers  in  the  United  States  can 
buy  their  boots  and  shoes  just  as  cheap  here  as  they  can  in  England. 


118  Protection  and  tJte  Faryners. 

"  If  you  will  then  go  into  your  hardware  stores  you  will  see  dis^ 
played  for  sale,  imported  from  the  United  States,  axes,  edge-tools, 
forks,  etc.,  etc.,  superior  in  quality  and  finish  and  cheaper  than 
you  can  make  them.  This  is  generally  admitted,  even  in  England. 
The  American  farmer  would  be  a  great  loser  if  he  was  compelled 
to  go  to  England  for  any  of  his  tools  or  implements  of  husbandry. 

"Furniture  constitutes  a  large  item  in  the  expenses  of  every 
farmer's  family,  but  you  do  not  mention  furniture  ;  was  its  omis- 
sion due  to  the  fact  that  it  is  about  ten  per  cent,  on  an  average 
cheaper  in  the  States  than  it  is  in  England  ? 

"  The  farmers  in  America  generally  have  time-pieces.  Why  did 
you  not  refer  to  them  ?  We  furnish  most  of  the  clocks  found  in 
the  houses  of  the  farmers  of  your  own  country.  Last  year  you 
imported  from  the  United  States  376,023  clocks.  Probably  in 
your  next  issue  you  will  explain  and  show  how  these  clocks  could 
be  repurchased  in  England  by  the  Western  farmers  and  brought 
back  to  this  country  so  as  to  save  forty  per  cent,  over  and  above 
what  they  would  have  cost  if  they  had  bought  them  here.  Pots, 
pans,  kettles,  and  tinware  of  all  kinds  are  retailed  as  cheap  here  as 
in  England,  and  so  witli  our  pressed  glassware. 

"  So  much  for  the  markets  in  which  the  farmer  buys  what  he 
consumes,  and  the  prices  he  has  to  pay.  We  have  seen  that  your 
statements  in  this  are  about  like  those  in  the  other  instances." 

The  comparison  needs  no  comment.  Will  you  pay- 
heed  to  the  English  free  trader  or  to  the  American  pro- 
tectionist in  Wisconsin? 

GRAIISr    AND    PROVISIOXS — EXPORTS    AND    HOME   CON- 
SUMPTION. 

Our  production  of  grain,  and  our  exports  of  wheat 
have  increased  largely.  In  1881  our  home  consumption 
of  wheat  was  295,962,780  bushels,  and  our  exports. 
184,886,943  bushels.  Corn,  a  larger  and  more  valuable 
crop  than  wheat,  is  much  less  exported.  In  1880  but 
88,000,000  bushels  were  sent  abroad,  while  1,629,434,543 
bushels  were  used  at  home.     Short  crops  in  Europe  and 


Protection  and  the  Farmers. 


119 


large  yields  at  home  made  our  Avheat  exports  very  large, 
but  tliese  favoring  conditions  are  not  permanent. 

In  the  last  thirty  years  there  has  been  a  surprising 
growth  in  the  magnitude  of  the  production  and  trade  of 
the  world,  and  especially  of  our  own  country.  Ncav 
implements  have  helped  the .  farmer  to  till  and  harvest 
great  crops  ;  new  machinery  and  ]iew  processes  have 
increased  manufactured  products ;  we  have  built  rail- 
ways through  vast  regions  of  productive  lands  and  wel- 
comed hosts  of  industrious  emigrants  to  till  those  fields, 
and  tlie  abundance  of  the  precious  metals  has  stimulated 
this  development,  while  our  protective  policy  has  made 
it  sure. 

Late  census  statistics  give  the  United  states  4,008,907 
farms  in  1880,    an   increase  from    2,659,985   in  1870 
which  does  not  show  any  rain  to  farmers. 

A  writer  in  the  New  York  Herald  finds  the  prices  of 
farm  products  stated  in  a  newspaper  in  the  interior  of 
that  State  in  1816,  and  compares  them  with  1882  as 
follows : 


Products. 


1816. 


1882. 


WTieat 

Corn 

Oats 

Eggs,  per  dozen 

Barley,  per  bushel 

Butter,  per  pound 

CI  .3se,  per  pound 

Cows,  per  head 

Cattle,  per  yoke 

Hay,  per  ton 

Straw,  jjer  ton 

Carriage  horses,  per  span 

Sheep,  per  head 

Farm  labor,  per  month. . . 


25c.  to  44c. 

$1.42 

12i^c.  to  20c. 

.60 

1.5e. 

.60 

5c. 

.15 

25c. 

.80 

.5c.  to  12c. 

.40 

3e.  to  6c. 

.13 

$16  to  $20 

$20  to  $100 

$25  to  $45 

$100  to  $250 

$3  to  $5 

$10  to  $20 

$2  to  $4 

$7  to  $16 

$1.50  to  $;:00 

$500  to  $1,200 

50c.  to  75c. 

$1.50  to  $2.50 

$3  to  $8 

$12  to  $25. 

120 


1* rotection  and  the  Farmers. 


The  following  prices  (from  the  Boston  Journal)  in 
1816  and  1882  for  a  few  manufactured  goods  and  other 
merchandise  purchased  l^y  the  farmer  indicate  the  great 
change  in  favor  of  the  agricultural  classes  and  other 
consumers  during  the  interval  : 


Articles. 


Steel,  per  pound 

Sawplate,  per  pound 

Nails,  per  pound 

Broadcloth,  per  yard . . . 
Wool  blankets,  per  pair, 
Cotton  cloth,  per  yard. . 

Calico,  per  yard 

Salt,  per  bushel 


1816. 


17c. 

10c. 

40c. 

26c. 

12^c. 

4c. 

$16. 

$4 

$10  to  $20 

$3  to  $10 

30c.  to  50c. 

4c.  to  12c. 

25c.  to  75c. 

4c.  to  16c. 

$1  to$4 

15c.  to  25c. 

1882. 


That  is  to  say,  the  average  increase  in  the  price  of 
farm  jiroduce  during  the  last  sixty-six  years  has  l^een 
from  300  to  400  per  cent.,  while  the  average  decrease  of 
the  price  of  manufactured  goods  during  the  same 
period  has  been  from  20  to  90  per  cent. 

While  our  foreign  market  has  grown,  we  must  keep 
clearly  in  mind  the  immense  importance  of  our  home 
consumption — more  stable  and  larger. 

Dr.  Gr.  B.  Loring,  U.  8,  Commissioner  of  Agi'iculture, 
said  in  New  York  in  November,  1881 : 

"The  aggregate  annual  product  of  the  manufacturing  and 
mechanical  industries  of  the  United  States  is  now  about 
$6,000,000,000.  Of  this,  less  than  $200,000,000  are  exported. 
And  of  the  $9,000,000,000  produced  by  agriculture,  less  than  ten 
per  cent,  is  exported.        ****** 

"I  have  alluded  to  the  producing  power  of  the  American  peo- 
l^Ic,  but  in  order  to  understand  the  relations  which  e.xist  between 
our  industries  we  should  not  forget  our  consiuning  capacity  also. 
Of  the  $15,000,000,000  produced  by  our  various  industries  nearly 


Protectiov  and  the  Farmers.  121 

$14,000,000,000  are  consumed  at  home.  It  is  the  home  market  to 
■which  the  American  producer  turns  most  naturally,  let  his  indus- 
try be  what  it  may." 

This  slioAvs  otir  home  trade  and  consumption  fourteen 
times  greater  than  our  large  foreign  trade.  He  goes  on 
to  show  the  value  of  fruits  and  other  perishable  crops, 
sold  only  in  near  markets,  lost  when  the  farm  is  far  from 
the  factory  or  the  town,  and  worth  many  millions. 

PROVISIOXS — EXPORTS. 

Only  our  grain  crops  have  been  considered,  but  tlie 
same  economic  laws  apply  to  the  other  products  of  the 
farm,  for  all  these  our  exports  are  large,  but  the  home 
demand  much  larger  and  better.  Leaving  out  cotton 
and  tobacco,  and  it  is  estimated  that  but  eiglit  per  cod. 
of  our  farm  products  are  exported,  and  ninety-two  per 
cent,  consumed  at  home.  By  a  late  report  of  the  Bureau 
of  Statistics  at  Wasliington,  our  exports  of  provisions, 
other  than  breadstufPs,  in  1881  were  $143,723,663,  of 
which  Great  Britain  took  over  1100,000,000.  To  get 
even  five  per  cent,  reduction  in  the  prices  of  our  farm 
products  would  be  a  yearly  gain  to  England  of  $25,000,- 
000,  and  a  free  trade  agitation,  even  if  it  does  not 
change  our  tariff  legislation,  checks  our  manufactures, 
pushes  more  surplus  grain  and  provisions  abroad  at 
lower  rates,  and  is  a  snug  way  for  our  British  cousins  to 
get  that  sum,  or  more,  our  farmers  heing  tlie  losers. 

A    HEALTHY    EQUILIBRIUM. 

It  is  a  sound  principle  in  political  economy  that  the 
manufactures  and  the  agriculture  of  a  country  should  be 
developed  in  healthy  equilibrium  to  each  other,  that 
each  may  supply  the  wants  of  the  other,  each  improve 


122  Protection  and  the  Farmers. 

tlie  other,  and  tlie  country  be  self-dependent.  Plainly 
enongh,  the  non-agTicultural  industries  of  the  United 
States  must  move  on  with  strong  and  rapid  steps  to  keep 
pace  with  the  agricultural. 

England  has  no  room  for  farms  to  feed  her  factories; 
we  have  too  few  factories  for  our  farms,  but  room 
enough  for  both,  and  so  we  can  reach  that  equilibrium 
which  she  cannot  attain  for  Avant  of  room.  To  reach  it 
is  the  aim  and  idea  of  a  jn'otective  policy.  To  destroy 
it — to  make  the  western  farmer  send  his  grain  and  meat 
to  feed  the  Leeds  factory  hand  in  England,  and  buy  the 
cloth  he  weaves  after  it  has  been  sent  across  ocean  and 
mountain  and  prairie — is  the  aim  of  British  free  trade. 

In  a  Congressional  speech  January  27th,  1883,  Hon. 
D.  C.  Haskell,  M.  C,  of  Kansas,  stated  this  case  very 
clearly: 

"lu  1840  the  number  of  persons  engaged  iu  agriculture  was 
3,717,536;  iu  1880  the  number  was  7,670,493;  population  of  the 
United  States  in  1840,  17,069,453;  population  of  the  United  States 
in  1880,  50,155,783. 

"It  will  be  seen  that  from  1840  to  1880  the  number  of  persons 
engaged  in  agriculture  had  a  little  more  than  doubled,  while  the 
total  population  of  the  United  States  from  1840  to  1880  had  nearly 
trebled. 

"  In  other  words,  in  1840  each  farmer  had  of  neighbors,  non- 
producers  of  agricultural  products,  to  buy  his  produce,  4|  persons;, 
in  1880  he  had  6f  persons  who  were  consumers  of  his  products,  an 
enormous  increase  in  demand  of  nearly  50  per  cent.  Had  the 
nation  been  remanded  to  the  productions  of  agriculture  for  support 
to  the  same  extent  as  it  was  in  1840,  and  had  the  number  of  farmers 
increased  as  the  total  population  increased,  there  would  now  be  in 
the  United  States  3,000,000  more  persons  engaged  iu  agriculture 
than  there  are. 

"  The  farming  interest  of  to-day  has  in  the  United  States  of  con- 
sumers, non-producers  of  agricultural  products,  not  competitors. 


Protection  and  the  Fanners.  123 

with  it,  a  population  of  nearly  seventeen  millions  more  than  it 
would  have  had  had  the  ratio  of  producers  and  consumers  of  1840 
been  continued. 

"  Will  any  one,  in  the  light  of  these  facts,  sneer  at  this  "home 
market  "  of  seventeen  millions?  The  statesmen  of  the  past  saw  in 
their  day  farmers'  produce,  under  free  trade  policy,  unsalable  at 
any  price.  We  see  a  steady  demand  at  living  prices  for  anything 
and  everything  edible  that  the  farmer  can  produce,  while  the 
prices  of  all  manufactured  articles  tend  lower  and  lower  year  by 
year. " 

Mr.  G.  B.  Dixwell  well  says  (review  of  Perry's  "Farm- 
ers and  the  Tarift'  ") :  "  In  twenty- live  years  the  po})ula- 
tion  of  our  whole  country  will  be  doitbled;  tliat  of  the 
now  less  settled  portions  increased  three  to  five  fold. 
Let  the  farmer  consider  whether  he  would  prefer  the 
increase  to  be  mostly  farmers,  or  peoj^le  v/ho  buy  and  do 
not  prodiice  farm  products.  It  will  not  take  him  long 
to  make  up  his  mind;  and  his  judgment  will  be  worth  as 
mucli  as  that  of  all  the  political  economists  of  Eurojie 
and  America.  His  judgment  will  agree  with  the 
mature  and  deliberate  oj^nion  of  such  men  as  Franklin, 
Hamilton,  Jefferson,  Andrew  Jackson,  Henry  Clay, 
Webster,  and  the  majority  of  the  great  statesmen  who 
have  been  the  pride  of  our  country." 

UN"CERTAINTY    OF   THE   FOREIGN    MARKET. 

Hon.  J.  E.  Dodge,  statistician  of  the  United  States 
Agricultural  Dei)artment  at  Washington,  said  in  one  of 
his  reports  : 

"There  is  no  doubt  that  the  wheat  farmer  is  at  the  mercy  of 
the  foreign  demand.  If  British  tields  are  blighted,  there  is  rejoic- 
ing on  our  prairies  over  remunerative  harvests.  If  the  garners  ol 
Continental  Europe  are  full  and  England's  wants  at  a  minimum, 
there  is  dissatisfaction  at  the  West,  liable  to  be  ventilated  on  the 
currency,  the  tariff  or  the  railroads.     *    *    The  heaviest  foreign 


124  Protection  and  the  Farmei's. 

demand  may  occur  in  a  season  of  low  production,  and  the  lightest 
in  a  year  of  abundance,  increasing  the  fluctuation.  *  *  *  The 
wheat-grower  is  at  one  time  elated  with  remunerative  prices,  and 
at  another  depressed  by  rates  which  fail  to  pay  the  cost  of  pro- 
duction. The  grain  crop  of  1878,  for  instance,  larger  by  six  per 
cent,  in  quantity  than  that  of  1877,  was  less  in  value  by  twenty- 
one  per  cent. 

"The  exports  of  lireadstuffs  in  eight  months,  up  to  February, 
1881,  were  $47,000,000  less  than  in  the  same  time  a  year  before. 
Wheat  fell  off  35,000,000  bushels." 

It  may  be  said  that  our  home  market  is  not  free  from 
troublesome  fluctuations.  This  is  true,  but  they  are  less 
than  those  abroad  ;  because  the  home  market  depends 
mainly  on  our  own  crops  and  welfare,  while  the  markets 
abroad  depend  on  the  crops  and  welfare  of  several 
countries. 

Tlie  Michigan  farmer,  near  the  lumber  regions,  sells 
his  hay,  wheat,  oats,  and  corn,  to  the  camps  and  mills  at 
good  rates,  largely  independent  of  foreign  prices-cur- 
rent. Tlie  Pennsylvanian,  with  a  sale  for  his  produce 
at  the  gr,  at  iron  mill  near  by,  is  less  troubled  about 
trans-Atlantic  ups  and  downs  than  his  brotlier  husband- 
man in  Iowa.  The  more  factories  everywhere  near  the 
farms  the  more  this  independence  becomes  national. 
Having  a  surplus  to  export,  as  the  Western  farmer  has 
and  will  have,  it  is  natural  and  wise  that  he  should 
watch  distant  marts  and  seek  cheap  transportation  ;  but 
it  is  far  from  natural  or  wise  for  him  to  be  jealous  of 
home  manufactures,  or  in  favor  of  a  free  trade  policy  to 
injure  them. 

"HOW    PROTECTION"    PEOTECTS    FARMERS." 

Such  is  the  title  of  a  paper  read  by  Mr.  Dodge  at 
a  meeting  of  the  A.^^sociation  of  Am:Y2Gan  Economists, 


I*7'otection  and  the  Farmers.  125 

in  Washington,   D.   C,  February  15th,  1883,  reported 
as  follows  : 

"Protection  enhances  the  value  of  land.  The  theory  is  that 
withdrawal  of  labor  from  agriculture  to  manufactures  and  mining 
increases  production,  stimulates  improvements,  compels  higher 
culture  and  soil  fertilization,  and  makes  land  more  productive,  and 
hence  more  valuable.  This  is  also  fact  as  well  as  theory,  that  is 
patent  to  everybody  and  defies  disproval.  The  census  returns 
are  a  repository  of  millions  of  such  facts.  Virginia  is  a  great 
State  in  advanc  e  of  Pennsylvania  in  settlement,  and  for  a  long 
period,  in  population.  It  is  rich  in  agricultural  resources,  in  coal 
and  iron,  water  power,  wood,  and  timber.  So  is  Pennsylvania. 
The  former  is  essentially  an  agricultural  State,  though  destined  to. 
become  great  in  mining  and  manufacturing.  It  hud  in  1880, 
according  to  the  census,  51.41  per  cent,  of  her  people  in  agricul- 
tural occupations.  The  value  of  her  farm  land  was  $10.89. 
Pennsylvania  had  but  20.68  per  cent,  of  her  workers  employed  in 
agriculture,  and  her  farm  lands  were  worth  $49.30  per  acre.  So 
with  other  States.  Ohio  has  40  per  cent,  of  her  people  engaged 
in  farming,  and  her  farm  lands  average  $45.97.  Kentucky, 
across  the  river  from  Ohio,  nearly  63  per  cent.,  and  her  lands, 
some  of  which  are  the  finest  in  the  world,  are  worth  only  $13.93 
per  acre.  Two  other  States,  lying  side  by  side  on  the  same  par- 
allel, settled  by  people  of  similar  origin  and  equal  intelligence — 
Illinois  and  Iowa — the  former  has  a  little  over  43  per  cent,  in  agri- 
culture and  lands  valued  at  $31.87  per  acre,  the  latter  over  57  per 
cent,  and  lands  worth  $23.93.  So  it  is  elsewhere  and  everywhere. 
A  state  or  nation  with  little  productive  industry  except  the  culti- 
vation of  the  soil  has  little  wealth,  few  markets,  and  no  induce- 
ment to  produce  a  surplus  of  anything.  Protection  increases  the 
value  of  production.  *  *  *  Dividing  the  States  and  Terri- 
tories into  four  sections,  the  first  comprising  the  manufacturing 
and  mining  areas,  and  including  all  having  a  smaller  proportion 
than  80  per  cent,  of  the  occupied  population  of  the  working  class 
engaged  in  agricultural  employments  ;  the  second  section  com- 
prising States  having  more  than  80  and  under  50  per  cent. ;  the 
third  including  all  having  over  50  per  cent,  and  less  than  70  per 
cent.,  and  the  fourth  including  all  States  with  more  than  75  per 
cent,  engaged  in  farming,  we  have  the  following  perfectly  natural. 


126  Protection  and  the  Farmers. 

not  to  say  inevitable,  results  :  First  section,  average  value  of  pro- 
duct per  man,  |467  ;  second  section,  $394  ;  third,  S5;261  ;  fourth, 
$161.  Thus  the  States  with  less  than  30  per  cent,  of  their  people 
engaged  in  farming  realize  nearly  three  times  as  much  per  man 
as  those  which  have  over  70  per  cent,  in  farm  work.  In  other 
words,  one  man  in  the  first  section  realizes  as  much  as  three  men 
in  the  last." 

The  British  Eoyal  Agricultural  Commission  Eeport  in 
1882  said  :  "It  is  safe  to  say  that,  for  the  last  two 
years,  the  agriculture  of  America  has  been  at  the  very 
flood  tide  of  its  prosperity."  Their  statement  confirms 
the  views  of  Mr.  Dodge. 


A   FARMERS   STATEMENT. 

In  a  late  speech  in  Congress,  Hon.  J.  T.  Updegraff, 
M.  C,  an  Ohio  farmer,  put  the  case  as  follows: 

"  I  have  been  a  farmer  all  my  life,  and  every  year  for  thirty 
years  have  sold  tlie  products  of  the  farm.  When  manufactures 
were  fully  protected  and  flourishing,  I  have  never  seen  the  time 
that  judicious  agriculture  was  not  prosperous ;  and  when  manu- 
facturing under  "  revenue"  tariff  was  crippled  or  broken  down  I 
never  saw  agriculture  flourishing.  Sometimes  a  certain  product 
may  be  in  demand  temporarily,  but  the  uniform  rule  is  as  I  have 
stated  it.  If  any  member  has  seen  it  otherwise,  let  him  declare 
it.  [Applause.]  No;  the  real  and  permanent  industries  of  a 
people  are  always  in  harmony  and  interdependence  with  each 
other.  Each  member  of  a  community  profits  by  an  increase  in 
the  productive  power  of  the  whole  body.  That  advantage  is 
increased  and  multiplied  by  every  increase  in  the  diversity  of 
employments.  The  farming  interest  above  every  other  is  bene- 
fited by  this  diversity,  which  saves  the  necessity  of  carrying  bulky 
products  to  a  distant  market ;  for  every  intelligi-nt  farmer  knows 
that  tlie  man  who  is  compelled  to  go  to  market  must,  in  some  way, 
pay  the  cost  of  going,  and  that  the  very  first  of  all  the  charges 
paid,  by  labor  or  by  land,  is  that  for  transportation." 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  127 

THE    WOOL   TARIFF — GAEFIELD'S   REPORT. 

The  tariff  on  wool  and  woolens  (somewhat  modified 
by  Congress  last  winter)  was  perfected  in  1867,  by 
mutual  consultation  between  growers  and  manufac- 
turers leading  to  congressional  legislation.  Its  results, 
as  to  wool,  are  given  in  the  Tariff  Commission  Report, 
and  can  be  stated  as  follows  :  Sheep  in  18G0,  22,471,- 
275;  in  1880,  43,576,897.  Pounds  of  wool  in  1860, 
60,264,913  ;  in  1880,  240,000,000— or  tivice  as  much 2Jer 
head  as  in  1860.  Prices  in  Boston,  in  currency,  aver- 
aged, in  1867,  51  cents ;  in  1875,  43  cents ;  in  1880,  48 
cents.  The  price  a  little  loAver,  but  the  sum  from  each 
pece  nearly  double,  as  the  result  of  imjjroved  breeds 
under  23rotective  encouragement  and  tvith  a  home  marhet 
— the  growers  benefited,  with  no  added  cost  to  the  con- 
sumers. 

The  last  labor,  as  a  Congressman,  of  James  A.  Gar- 
field was  a  report  favoring  the  retention  of  the  duty  on 
wool.  It  occupied  him  up  to  the  very  hour  of  leaving 
his  Washington  home  for  Chicago,  where  he  was  nomi- 
nated for  President.  In  that  report.  May  24th,  1880, 
he  said  : 

"Should  it  (the  removal  or  unjust  change  of  the  wool  tariff) 
become  a  law,  it  will  be  impossible  for  our  farmers  to  compete  in 
the  market  with  the  mestiza  wools  of  South  America;  and  it  will 
be  equally  impossible  for  our  manufacturers  to  compete  with 
those  of  France  and  England.  Of  course,  any  legislation  that 
destroy  the  woolen  manufacturers  is  equally  destructive  to  sheep 
husbandry,  for  the  farmer  would  no  longer  have  a  market  for  his 
wool.  That  nation  can  hardly  be  called  independent  which  does 
not  possess  the  materials  and  the  skill  to  clothe  its  own  people. 
****** 

"In  1860  we  were  largely  dependent  for  our  clothing  upon 
foreign  wool  growers  and  foreign  manufacturers,  at  such  prices 
as  they  were  able  to  dictate.     Now,  the  woolen  fabrics  used  by 


128 


ProteGtlon  and  the  Famiers. 


our  people  are  mainly  manufactured  by  the  skill  and  labor  of  our 
own  artisans  from  tlie  product  of  our  own  flocks.  No  attentive 
observer  who  visited  the  Centennial  Exposition  failed  to  notice 
the  astonishment  with  which  the  French  and  English  manufact- 
lU'ers  examined  the  fine  cloths  produced  by  American  looms ; 
and  no  feature  of  that  great  exhibition  reflected  more  credit  upou 
American  enterprise  and  skill. 

"As  a  revenue  measure,  the  tariff  of  1867  on  wools  and  woolens 
has  been  very  efl'ective,  having  produced  $;360,000,000  of  revenue 
in  the  last  thirteen  years,  an  average  of  $28,000,000  per  annum," 

INCREASE    OF   FAKMING    WEALTH    1860   TO    1880. 

Edward  Young,  late  chief  of  the  United  States 
Bureau  of  Statistics,  gives  the  following  facts,  telling 
the  growth  of  farming  wealth  in  twenty  years  of  a  pro- 
tective tariff — a  groAvth  unequalled,  and  the  more  won- 
derful Avhen  we  think  of  the  awful  waste  of  a  great  civil 
war  during  this  j^eriod. 

l^hcse  eloquent  figures  need  no  comment. 


Subjects. 

1860. 

1880. 

Increase, 
per  cent. 

"Value  of  farms 

$3,271,575,420 

$10,197,101,905 

213 

Wheat  produced,  bushels 

173,104,924 

498,549,808 

188 

Wheat  exported,         "       .... 

4,155,153 

153,252,795 

3,603 

Corn  produced,           "       

838,792,742 

1,717,434,543 

105 

Corn  exported,           "       

3,314,305 

98,169,877 

2,862 

Wool  produced,  pounds 

60,204,013 

232,.500,000 

286 

Cotton  produced,  bales 

3,826,080 

6,313,209 

65 

Oats  produced,  bushels 

172,04:^,185 

407,858.999 

136 

Barley  produced,     "      

15,825,898 

44,113,495 

179 

Cheese  exported,  pounds 

15,524,830 

127,553,907 

722 

Hogs  packed 

2,350,822 

6,950.451 

196 

Improved  lands,  acres 

163,110,720 

287,211,845 

76 

Official  figures  give  like  facts  as  follows  : 

Value  op                             1860.  1870. 
Farm   implements 

and  machinery.!    246,000,000  $    336,878,000 

Livestock 1,107,500,000  2,447,539.000 


1880. 

\    900,000,000 
5,000,000,000 


Protection  and  the  Farmers.  129 

The  peaceful  march  of  an  army  of  skilled  and  stalwart 
artisans  should  be  westward,  where,  as  the  poet  tells  us, 
"  The  star  of  empire  takes  its  way." 

Another  like  ai-my  of  occupation  should  march  south- 
ward, where  room  is  ample  and  raw  material  abundant. 
Farmers  and  merchants,  and  all  the  people,  should 
wheel  into  line,  and  over  the  united  hosts  should  be 
flung  out  a  white  banner  with  the  golden  motto  on  its 
broad  folds :  Protection  to  Home  Industry — The 
American  Market  for  the  American  People. 


CHAPTER  X. 

WAGES  AND  PROTECTION. 

Low  wages  means  coarse  and  scanty  living,  defective 
education,  narrow  thought  and  cramped  life.  Beautiful 
virtue  and  spiritual  grace  sometimes  light  up  the  homes 
of  the  poor,  but  large  populations  standing  on  the  verge 
of  want  are  not  the  nurseries  of  the  best  manhood  and 
womanhood.  On  the  broad  scale  hard  work  at  pauper 
pay  makes  human  life  dull  and  sickly,  or  breeds  passion 
and  crime.  Inevitably,  too,  such  a  condition  creates  a 
jealous  hatred  toward  those  who  win  wealth  from  ill-paid 
toil.  The  noblest  aspirations  and  hopes  are  crushed, 
and  there  comes  a  weight  of  dumb  despair  or  a  mood  of 
bitter  endurance. 

Gerald  Massey,  son  of  a  poor  English  working  man, 
knew  the  feelings  of  the  class  from  whence  he  sprang, 
and  could  utter  them  in  impassioned  words.    He  said: 

"Press  on!  a  million  pauper-forelieads  bend  in  misery's  dust; 
God's  champions  of  the  golden  truth  still  eat  the  mouldy  crust: 
This  damning  curse  of  tyrants  must  not  kill  the  nation's  heart; 
The  spirit  in  a  million  slaves  doth  pant  on  fire  to  start, 
And  strive  to  mend  the  vporld,  and  walk  in  Freedom's  march 

sublime; 
While  myriads  sink  heart-broken,  and  the  land  o'er-swarms  with 

crime. 
'Oh  God!'  they  cry,  'we  die,  we  die,  and  see  no  earnest  won!' 
Brothers,  join  hand  and  heart,  and  in  the  work  press  on!" 

Such  wages  as  give  possibility  for  comfort  and  taste, 
for  accumulation,  education,  and  the  hope  of  a  larger 

130 


Wages  and  Protection.  131 

life,  tend  to  good  feeling  and  to  harmony  and  equality 
of  rights  and  condition.  The  fairly  paid  artisan  or 
laborer  feels  less  a  slave  and  more  a  co-operative  helper 
of  the  emj^loyer,  with  common  hopes  and  interests.  He 
is  a  m,an  and  not  a  human  machine. 

Our  protective  policy  is  of  more  value  to  the  worhiium 
than  to  the  capitalist, — is  indeed  largely  a  matter  of 
wages.  Our  duties  on  imj^orts  are  no  more  than  equiva- 
lents for  the  larger  pay  of  the  American  workman. 
With  labor  as  cheap  as  in  England  we  could  produce 
cheaper  here  than  there. 

In  his  report  on  iron  and  steel,  as  U.  S.  Commissioner 
to  the  Paris  Exposition  in  1867,  Abram  S.  Hewitt  said: 

"We  have  seen  that  the  cost  of  making  iron  in  England,  Bel- 
gium and  France  varies  from  $32.50  to  $40  per  ton,  and  $5  addi- 
tional pays  its  transportation  to  our  seaboard  ports.  At  these 
same  ports  American  iron  cannot  be  delivered  at  less  than  $60  in 
gold,  against  $40  for  the  foreign  article,  and  the  entire  difference 
consists  in  the  higher  wages,  and  not  in  the  larger  quantity  of  labor 
required  for  its  production  in  the  United  States,  where  the  phj'sical, 
mental  and  moral  condition  of  the  working  classes  occupy  a  dif- 
ferent standard  from  their  European  confreres,  and  where  wages 
cannot  be  reduced  without  violating  om-  sense  of  the  just  demands 
of  human  nature." 

Such  reduction  of  wages  in  this  country,  fortunately, 
is  not  possible,  certainly  is  far  from  desirable,  and  is  not 
Avished  for  by  a  large  majority  of  employers.  They 
know  and  feel  that  the  conditions  of  trade  and  produc- 
tion which  enable  them  to  pay  our  present  rates  are  bet- 
ter for  all. 

Free  trade  for  the  United  States  means  low  wages. 
In  his  address  at  the  Wisconsin  State  Fair,  E.  B.  Ward 
said  : 

' '  The  elevation  of  labor  is  called  '  the  sentiment  which  created 
civilization.'     Sometimes  we  find  a  frank  statement  of  the  effects 


132  Wages  and  Protection. 

of  free  trade,  as  in  a  late  New  York  journal,  where  a  writer 
says :  '  I  am  for  unqualified  free  trade.  I  would  sell  out  the 
Custom  Houses,  discharge  the  leeches  there,  and  allow  people  to 
sell  and  buy  wherever  they  please.  This  will  bring  us  to  a  true  and 
normal  relation.  Commercial  disturbance  would  result.  We 
should  be  on  a  new  foundation.  The  first  effect  would  be  to  stop 
manufacturing  here  and  fill  the  country  with  foreign  goods,  many 
of  which  Europe  would  never  see  her  money  for.  A  commercial 
revolution  would  follow,  laborers  would  be  out  of  employment, 
and  the  price  of  labor  would  come  down,  doion,  U7itil  it  reached  the 
European  standard,  and  then  success  is  assured.'  Success,  possi- 
bly, for  the  few,  but  hard  work  at  pauper  pay  for  the  many  ! " 

The  Chicago  Western  Manufacturer  finds  in  the  Cin- 
cinnati Trade  List  the  statement  that  a  well-known 
Kentucky  free  trader  (whose  name  they  will  give  if 
called  for)  said  to  them  a  few  months  ago  that  low 
wages  was  jnst  what  he  and  his  associates  wanted.  He 
observed  :  "  The  laborer  in  this  country  is  getting  to  be 
too  smart  and  independent.  Unless  he  is  brought  down 
a  peg  pretty  soon  he  will  rule  us  all.  He  gets  too  much 
by  half.  You  exclaim  against  foreign  competition, 
because  it  will  reduce  the  price  of  labor.  I  favor  it  for 
exactly  the  same  reason.  I  want  to  see  these  ignorant 
fellows,  who  know  nothing  excejDt  to  work  Avith  their 
dirty  hands,  Ijrought  down  to  their  proper  level.  We 
will  never  i^rosper  in  this  country  until  it  is  done." 

AMERICAlSr   AND    FOREIGN    WAGES    AND    EXPENSES. 

By  a  condensation  of  tables  of  wages  and  cost  of  food, — 
from  State  Department,  Labor,  1878, — we  find  the  aver- 
age weekly  wages  of  seventeen  trades — bricklayers,  black- 
smiths, shoemakers,  etc. — to  be,  in  England  $7.57,  Scot- 
land $7.22,  New  York  $12.70,  Chicago  $11.50.  The 
cost  of  thirteen  kinds  of  food, — breadstutfs,  meat,  butter. 


W((y/es  and  Protection.  133 

-etc.— is  |;2.50  in  Liverpool,  |;1.30  in  New  York,  ll.lu  in 
Chicago  for  a  like  qnantity — a  pound  of  eacli  kind,  or 
thirteen  pound  s  in  all.  Eent  would  be  somewhat  cheaper 
in  Great  Britain,  but  houses  much  poorer.  The  whole 
mode  of  life  there  poorer  than  here,  among  like  classes, 
and  the  ability  to  save  from  wages  less,  as  will  be  shown 
more  fully.  The  British  Almanac,  1881,  stated  that  but 
59  per  cent  of  Irish  laborers  ate  meat,  and  those  but  5 
ounces  a  week.  U.  S.  Consul  Farrell  rei)orts  from  Bris- 
tol, England,  in  1881,  average  wages  of  farm  laborers 
per  week,  without  board  14.00;  and  the  State  Depart- 
ment table  quoted  from  gives  the  same  wages  for  Eng- 
land 13.60,  Scotland  14.25. 

An  English  government  agent's  report,  from  this 
country,  gives  this  statement  : 

"A  laboring  man  with  a  family  of  eight  children  told  me  the 
other  day,  after  reviewing  with  this  man  in  regard  to  the  great  sav- 
ing on  the  necessaries  of  life  in  his  native  country  (Germany),  as 
compared  with  his  adopted  country,  and  asking  him  how  much 
better  off  he  considered  himself  by  the  move,  he  replied  in  sub- 
stance: '  I  am  ever  so  much  better  off.  My  earnings  in  Germany 
(as  a  plasterer)  would  be  barely  3  shillings  a  day,  while  here  they 
are  from  11  to  12  shillings.  My  eldest  boy,  who  is  just  sixteen 
years  old,  makes  his  4  shillings  a  day  already,  more  than  I  could 
have  done  myself  at  home,  and  pays  me  something  for  his  board. 
Even  my  youngest,  of  thirteen,  earns  8  shillings  a  week,  while  he 
learns  a  trade.  In  Germany  neither  of  the  two  would  bring  home 
a  sixpence.  In  short,  if  I  were  there  I  should,  with  my  large 
family,  be  little  better  than  a  pauper,  while  here  I  have  saved 
enough  already  to  purchase  a  comfortable  cottage,  and  I  have 
something  in  the  savings  bank  still.'     It  is  worth  noting— 

Says  the  writer-^ 

that  in  this,  as  in  every  similar  case  which  has  come  within  my 
own  personal  knowledge,  the  laborer's  cottage  has  been  purchased 
with  savings  laid  up  since  1860." 


134  Wages  and  Protection. 

Our  consul  at  Cologne  reports — 

Masons,  per  day 70  cents 

Carpenters,  per  day 50  to  73     " 

Engine  fitters,  per  day 71  to  77     " 

Blacksmiths,  per  day 67  to  71     " 

The  report  of  the  tariff  commission  gives  the  following- 
as  the  wages  paid  in  England  and  Pittsburg,  Pa.,  for 
manufacturing  iron : 

England.  Pittsburg. 

Puddling,  per  ton $1  94  $5  50 

Shingling,  per  ton 29  77 

Rolling  in  puddle  mill,  per  ton. .       29  68| 

Rolling  and  heating,  per  ton. ...  1  80  4  80 

Common  labor 56@73        1  30@150 

Mr.  Edward  Young,  former  chief  of  U.  S.  Bureau  of 
Statistics  at  Washington,  makes  the  following  state- 
ment : 

Middleboro, 
Wages  in  Boiling  Mills,  1878.  Eng.  Pennsylvania. 

Puddlers $10  50  |21  15 

Top  and  bottom  rollers 16  05  27  50 

Rail  mill  rollers 3105  40  00 

Merchant  mill  rollers 13  10  36  83 

Machinists 8  59  15  56 

Engineers 8  47  15  24 

Laborers 4  65  8  58 

Iron  molders 6  77  11  00 

Pattern  makers 7  01  14  69 

Mr.  Casson,  tlie  general  manager  of  the  Earl  of  Dud- 
ley's  Staffordshire  iron  works,  in  his  recent  visit  to  Pitts- 
burgh, in  answer  to  a  question  by  a  reporter  of  the  Pitts- 
burgh Commercial-Gazette,  said: 

"I  find  that  in  many  respects  you  have  the  advantage  of  us  as 
regards  mechanical  appliances,  while  in  others  we  are  greatly 


Wa^es  and  Protection.  135 

ahead  of  your  manufacturers.  We  can  manufacture  iron  at  just  one- 
half  the  cost  as  far  as  the  price  of  labor  is  concerned.  I  find  that 
your  rate  of  wages  is  about  exactly  double  what  we  have  to  pay. " 

In  the  face  of  such  testimony  as  this,  a  tract  issued 
by  the  New  York  Free  Trade  Chib  in  1882,  entitled 
"Census  Eevehitions  Respecting  Wages,  &c.,"  of  "Iron 
and  Steel  Industries,"  quotes  the  statement  of  James 
M.  Swank,  of  Philadelphia,  iron  and  steel  census 
taker,  that  "the  wages  of  labor  in  this  country  are 
much  higher  than  in  any  other  iron-making  country  in. 
the  world,"  and  says  :  "It  is  in  conflict  Avith  all  other 
testimony ;  we  cannot  accept  it."  It  also  affirms  :  "  But 
in  point  of  fact,  the  English  wages  in  this  department 
of  industry  are  not  far  from  the  very  low  rates  of  wages 
here,  if  indeed  they  are  not  actually  higher."  The 
worthlessness  of  this  tract  may  be  judged  by  the  reck- 
lessness of  these  assertions.  The  same  tract  states  the 
average  wages  of  iron  and  steel  workers  at  |>1.30  per  day 
by  the  census  of  1880.  Its  figures  are  140,975  persons 
employed,  with  total  wages  of  155,476,785.  Tlieir 
result  appears  correct,  but  is  not,  for  they  assume  that 
all  these  men  were  employed  every  day  of  the  three 
hundred,  or  three  hundred  and  forty  working  days  of 
the  year.  This  is  not  true.  Some  chose  not  to  work 
constantly,  and  others  earned  money  in  other  ways  wlien 
not  in  the  mills.  This  method  of  making  wages  appear 
lower  than  they  are  is  applied  to  other  industries. 

On  the  contrary,  our  reports  of  English  wages  are 
sometimes  too  high.  In  the  Report  on  Labor,  by  W.  M. 
Evarts,  Secretary  of  State,  quoted  by  0.  S.  Hill,  of  the 
State  Department,  as  "  standard  authority,"  we  learn 
that  "the  English  rates  (wages)  are  more  apparent  tlian 
real,  and  that  while  nominally  the  English  workman 


136  Wages  and  Protection. 

appears  to  receive  a  comparatively  high  rate  of  wages, 
ho  only  works  on  half  or  two-thirds  time,  thus  gratify- 
ing his  desire  to  preserve  a  high  rate  of  wages,  at  tho 
expense  of  a  sentimental  fiction  which  is  neither  profit- 
able nor  substantial.'"' 

Along  with  this  effort  to  make  wages  appear  less  than 
they  are  is  another  to  make  the  employer's  profits  appear 
too  large,  and  so  make  out  a  case  against  the  "protected 
monopolists." 

They  take,  for  instance,  the  census  figures  of  the  iron 
and  steel  industry,  and  this  would  be  the  mode  of  state- 
ment : 

Value  of  materials  used $191,271,150 

Total  wages  paid 55,476,785 

Total  cost  of  product $246,747,935 

Value  of  product $296,557,385 

Deduct  cost 246.747,935 

Profit $49,809,450 

This  is  22  per  cent,  on  the  capital  of  1230,971,884 
invested,  hut  insurance,  decay  and  interest  are  left  out. 
Does  an  iron  mill,  or  a  woolen  mill,  last  forever  ?  Suja- 
pose  it  to  last  twenty-five  years.  The  annual  loss  is  four 
per  cent.,  and  all  these  items  which  are  not  counted  can 
be  reckoned  as  twelve  per  cent,  at  least,  leaving  ten  per 
cent,  net  profit  instead  of  twenty-two  per  cent.  Tliis 
is  a  good  profit  in  a  prosperous  year,  and  helps  to  make 
up  years  in  which  such  mills  paid  nothing. 

It  may  be  said,  wages  are  higher  in  England  tlian  in 
protective  Germany,  and  this  sliows  that  they  are  not 
affected  by  free  trade  or  protection.  In  old  and  densely 
peopled  countries,  where  aristocratic  institutions  have 
made  life  poor  and  sendle  among  the  pco])le,  we  yet  find 


Wages  and  Protection.  137 

that  where  there  are  large,  varied,  and  well  established 
industries,  labor  and  skill  are  more  employed,  and  better 
paid,  than  in  otlier  old  countries  with  fewer  and  feebler 
industries.  England,  by  rigidly  protective  tariffs,  per- 
sistent vigor,  and  careful  attention  to  her  industries  for 
centuries, — an  attention  that  hardly  a  nation  in  Europe, 
certainly  not  Germany,  has  given  for  so  long  a  time — 
brought  her  great  manufactures  to  a  solid  condition,  and 
therefore  wages  are  higher  than  in  Germany.  Her  short 
free  trade  career  has  not  yet  broken  down  this  result  of 
her  long  protective  policy,  but  her  wages  are  much  lower 
than  ours.  In  our  new  and  active  country  labor  is  in 
demand;  our  manufactures,  built  up  under  protection, 
help  greatly  to  keep  up  that  demand  and  to  hold  wages 
to  our  higher  level,  which  could  not  be  done  under  free 
trade.  A  protective  policy  lives,  and  is  to  live,  in  this 
country,  and  our  intelligent  people  see  that,  for  them, 
free  trade  means  poor  pay  for  poor  work — the  lower  level 
of  a  European  working  life. 

The  Germans,  and  other  Europeans,  started  with  a 
coarse  and  narrow  life,  and  have  risen  in  the  scale  as 
their  industries  have  grown  under  a  protective  policy. 
That  policy  works  upward,  but  can  work  no  miracles, 
and  is  hampered  by  military  conscriptions  in  Europe, 
and  by  other  troubles  from  which  we  are  fortunately  free. 
The  German  Iron  and  Steel  Association  report  tabulates 
the  returns  from  338  iron  and  steel  makers  and  machin- 
ists, and  gives  15  per  cent,  increase  of  wages  from  1879 
to  1882,  under  their  new  protective  measures. 

In  this  country  we  started  with  a  higher  level  of  life, 
and  with  institutions  aiming  for  personal  freedom  and 
equal  rights.  Our  peojile  never  have,  and  never  will, 
accept  the  pauper  pay  and  hopeless  lot  of  Old  World 


138  Wages  and  Protection. 

toilers.  Facts  show  plainly  enough  that  protection  is  a 
bar  against  lower  wages  in  this  country;  that  in  all  coun- 
tries their  industrial  policy  affects  the  price  of  labor, 
protection  helping  to  better  work  and  pay;  and  that 
other  influences, — previous  condition,  race,  free  or  des- 
potic institutions,  intelligence,  etc., — have  their  share  in 
the  matter.  England  had  the  oldest  protective  policy, 
and  the  best  institutions  comparatively,  and  her  wages 
are  above  those  on  the  Continent.  France  began  her 
protective  policy  earlier  than  Germany,  and  her  wages- 
are  higher. 

Free  traders  say  that  we  have  no  protective  tariff 
against  the  self-importation  of  cheap  laborers,  and  that 
therefore  this  talk  about  higher  wages  is  absurd,  while 
foreigners  are  free  to  come  here  and  share  and  reduce 
them.  In  our  broad  land  we  want  emigrants,  and  they 
help  in  needed  work  and  add  to  our  wealth,  therefore  it 
would  be  absurd  to  hinder  their  coming.  It  often  takes 
the  slow  savings  of  years  for  a  poor  workman  to  come 
from  Europe  to  America,  and  that  is  barrier  enough 
without  a  tax  on  immigration  ill  suited  to  the  genius  of 
our  government.  Yet  they  come  largely,  to  share  our 
better  life.  The  tide  sets  Westward  and  the  returning 
tide  is  but  the  spray  tossed  back  by  the  mighty  waves 
sweeping  across  the  Atlantic.  How  protection  crushes 
the  working  man!  Yet  he  toils  and  saves  for  years  to 
pay  his  way  here  to  be  crushed!  Granting  that  immi- 
gration may  cheapen  labor,  it  is  better  for  us  to  feed  and 
clothe  the  laborer  here  than  to  admit  the  products  of  his. 
cheap  labor  free  from  abroatl  and  send  food  and  money 
across  the  ocean  to  pay  for  them,  as  free  trade  would 
have  us  do. 

It  is  said  that  British  workmen  are  better  off  under 


Wa(/es  and  Protection.  139 

free  trade  than  they  were  under  protection.  The  pitiful 
fact  is  that  the  policy  of  that  government,  under  what* 
ever  name,  has  paid  small  attention  to  the  condition  or- 
wants  of  the  people.  Centuries  ago  laws  were  enacted, 
regulating  wages,  but  they  were  framed  to  compel  men 
to  work  for  certain  specified  pay  rather  than  to  prohibit, 
employers  from  oppressing  the  poor. 

President  Hamlin,  of  Middlebury  College,  Vermont, 
criticising  Professor  Perry  on  "The  Farmer  and  the 
Tariff  "  in  The  Americaji  Protectionist  in  New  York, 
says  of  free  trade  in  England: 

"  It  does  not  diminish  pauperism.  In  England  the  laboring; 
classes,  manufactmlng  and  agricultural,  are  no  better  off  than  they- 
were  fifty  or  one  hundred  years  ago.  On  the  contrary,  the  differ-- 
ence  between  them  and  the  rich  is  greater  than  ever.  If  free  trade: 
has  been  a  blessing  to  England,  her  millions  of  laborers  have  no 
shane  in  it.  They  have  made  no  progress.  The  wonderful  inven- 
tions of  the  age,  the  better  modes  of  living,  the  higher  enjoymenta 
of  life,  pass  them  by  in  the  sweat  and  grime  of  their  ill-requited 
toil;  and  if  hope  ever  comes  to  them  at  all,  it  is  the  immortal  hope 
of  another  life. 

"In  proof  of  this  assertion  that  free  trade  has  in  no  respect  ben- 
efited tile  laborers  of  England,  on  the  farm  or  in  the  workshop,  I 
quote  from  one  of  the  most  distinguished  advocates  of  free  trade 
in  England — Henry  Fawcett,  M.  P.,  Professor  of  Political  Econ- 
omy in  the  University  of  Cambridge. 

"In  his  'Political  Economy,'  extensively  used  as  a  text-book  in 
this  country  and  in  England  (page  133),  after  referring  to  the  pro- 
digious increase  of  British  exports,  he  adds,  '  This  increase  of 
national  prosperity  has  as  yet  effected  no  corresponding  improve- 
ment in  the  condition  of  the  laboring  classes.'  He  then  goes  onto 
state  that  where  there  has  been  an  increase  of  wages  there  has  been 
a  proportionate  increase  in  the  cost  of  living,  so  that  one  barely 
compensates  for  the  otlici-. 

"He  then  refers  to  Mr.  Brassey.  who  is  another  distinguished 
free-trader.     His  book  on    '  Work  and  Wages '   Prof.    Fawcett 


140  Wages  and  Protection. 

endorses  as  of  the  highest  authority,  as  perfectly  accurate,  as 
evincing  the  most  careful  investigation.  The  following  are  some 
of  the  results: 

"  In  the  Canada  Engineering  Works  at  Birkenhead,  thirteen  dif- 
ferent classes  of  workmen  are  employed,  such  as  titters,  turners, 
coppersmiths,  etc. ;  of  these  thirteen  classes  six  were  receiving  less 
wages  in  1869  than  in  1854,  three  were  receiving  the  same,  and 
four  were  receiving  somewhat  higher  wages. 

"  In  one  of  the  Government  dockyards,  the  result  was  even  less 
favorable.  From  1849  to  18.59  three  classes  had  an  advance  of  six- 
pence a  day,  but  from  1859  to  1869  no  advance  whatever.  '  Wages 
were  absolutely  stationary  throughout  these  years '  (page  134). 

"  Twenty  classes  of  laborers  in  private  ship-yards  on  the  Thames 
showed  the  same  wages  in  1869  as  in  1851.  There  was  a  tempo- 
rary rise  in  1865,  but  it  was  dearly  purchased  by  the  distress  that 
followed. 

"Mr.  Brassey  thinks  that  building-trades  are  somewhat  better 
paid,  but  '  the  increase  in  wages  has  not  been  proportionate  to  the 
increase  in  the  cost  of  living.'  Prof.  Fawcett  confesses  that  'iu 
other  trades  the  condition  of  the  laborer  must  liave  deteriorated ' 
(p.  135).  But  even  in  the  very  best  paid  trades  it  must  also  have 
■deteriorateJ,  according  to  his  own  showing. 

"  It  is  a  point  of  interest  and  essential  to  a  right  judgment  upon 
free  trade  in  England,  to  know  how  great  has  been  the  increase  in 
the  expenses  of  living  during  these  years  of  its  greatest  develop- 
ment. Prof.  Fawcett  (p.  134)  considers  it  not  less  than  thirty  per 
cent!  The  best  paid  laborers,  who  are  comparatively  few,  have 
hardly  held  their  own.  What,  then,  is  the  condition  of  the  multi- 
tude? What  has  free  trade  bestowed  upon  the  English  laborer  in 
general,  on  the  farm  and  in  the  workshop?  It  is  the  same  as  a 
decrease  of  wages  during  the  last  thirty  years  of  almost  one-third. 
His  condition,  never  very  hopeful,  is  now  hopeless." 

Robert  P.  Porter,  late  member  of  tlie  Tariff  Com- 
mission, writes  from  Leeds,  England,  a  great  centre  of 
woolen  mills,  to  the  Neiv  York  Tribune,  under  date  of 
January  23d,  1883,  and  gives  a  list  of  the  wages  of 
twenty  grades  of  operatives  in  those  mills,  as  computed 
from  their  account  books,  and  also  a  like  list  of  wages 


Wages  and  Protection.  141 

for  the  same  work  in  New  England  mills,  from  the 
report  of  C.  D.  Wright,  Massachnsetts  labor  statisti- 
cian. The  English  wages  range  from  $7.oO  to  $2.50 
(for  boys),  and  average  $4.65  per  week;  the  American 
wages  range  from  $13.43  to  $4.81,  and  average  $7.79  i)er 
week.  Hon.  W.  A.  Russell,  M.  C,  makes  a  like  com- 
parison of  nineteen  grades  of  worsted  mill  operatives 
in  both  countries,  from  reports  of  treasurers  here  and 
authentic  documents  there,  and  makes  English  weekly 
wages  average  $7.04  for  50  hours'  work  per  week,  and 
American  pay  average  $16. 73  for  60  hours'  work. 

Hours  of  labor  and  currency  at  or  below  par  are  to  be 
thouglit  of.  For  instance,  wages  in  some  years  between 
1860  and  1870  were  in  depreciated  currency,  and  appear 
more  than  they  were.  These  items  cannot  always  be 
exactly  estimated,  but  the  best  authorities  giving  nearest 
to  accurate  facts,  are  quoted. 

Professor  Leone  Levi,  of  London,  in  his  "  Estimates 
of  the  Earnings  of  the  Working  Classes,"  gives  the 
average  earnings  of  551  workers  in  an  English  cotton 
mill  at  $3.50  per  week  in  1807.  In  April,  1869,  the 
wages  of  2,997  Pacific  Mill  operatives,  a  woolen  mill  at 
Lawrence,  Massachusetts  (their  whole  force),  averaged 
$7.83  (or  $5.87  in  gold)  per  week,  a  difference  of  $2.31 
gold,  or  65  per  cent.,  in  favor  of  the  American  mills. 
Tlie  excess  of  wages  above  cost  of  board  and  lodging 
was  somewhat  greater  in  our  favor.  Of  781  house- 
keepers in  the  Pacific  mills,  Mr.  Greeley  says  (see 
Political  Economy)  that  227  lived  in  their  own  houses, 
worth  $413,163,  or  an  average  of  $1,820  to  each  family, 
mostly  their  own  earnings.  This  comparison  might  be 
even  more  favorable  to-day,  as  the  Boston  Commercinl 
Bulletin   gives   careful   tables    of    wages   of    sixty-two 


142  Wages  and  Protectiwx. 

grades  of  operatives,  making  *'tlie  average  wages  of 
woolen  mill  operatives  in  Massachusetts  forty  per  cent, 
higher  than  iu  18G0." 

COST   OF  LIVING  AND  WAGES. 

Carrol  D.  Wriglit,  Chief  of  Massachusetts  Bureau  of 
Statistics,  gives  a  statement,  in  March,  1881,  of  com- 
parative wages  and  costs  of  living  of  a  weaver  with  a 
wife  and  three  children  in  that  State,  and  in  Lanca- 
shire, England,  on  the  same  work  in  cotton  mills,  bas- 
ing his  statements  on  reports  of  Consuls  and  other  good 
authority.  The  result  gives  the  Massachusetts  weaver 
above  costs  of  food,  rent  and  fuel,  $2.30  per  week,  the 
Lancashire  weaver  22|  cents.  A  cotton  spinner's  sur- 
plus would  be  $5.79  here,  and  $2.98  in  the  Blackburn 
mills,  in  England.  The  London  Times,  July,  1880,  dis- 
cussing the  prospects  of  free  trade  in  the  United  States, 
said  : 

"The  United  States  do  not  approach  the  question  from  the  same 
point  of  view  as  ourselves.  The  object  of  their  statesmen  is  not 
to  secure  the  Uirgest  amount  of  wealth  for  the  country  generally, 
but  to  keep  rip,  by  wJmtever  ineans,  the  standard  of  comfort  among 
the  laboring  classes." 

This  is  fair  testimony,  from  a  great  English  journal, 
of  the  benefit  of  our  protective  policy  to  our  workmen  ; 
but  we  also  secure  ''the  largest  amount  of  wealth  for 
the  country  "  by  that  policy. 

Exceptional  circumstances  vary  costs  as  compared  to 
wages.  For  instance,  Mr.  Wright's  Report  in  1882  gives 
increase  of  wages  since  1878  seven  per  cent.;  increase 
of  cost  of  living  in  his  State,  22  per  cent.  Very  poor 
crops  of  grass,  fruits  and  vegetables,  with  consequent 
high  prices,  explains  this.     Usual  crops  will  make  the 


Wages  and  Protection.  143 

prices  of  the  farmer  less  and  the  costs  of  the  operatives 
less  also.  For  a  long  term  of  years  the  operatives'  con- 
dition is  better  here  than  in  any  other  country,  as  the 
following  facts  show : 

SAVINGS    BANK    DEPOSITS   AT   HOME   AND    IN"    ENGLAND. 

The  Detroit  Post  and  Tribune  gives,  from  official 
reports,  the  aggi'egate  deposits  in  the  savings  banks  in 
Maine,  New  Hampshire,  Vermont,  Massachusetts,  Rhode 
Island,  Connecticut,  New  York,  New  Jersey  and  Cali- 
fornia for  the  years  1850,  18G0,  1870  and  1881: 

Deposits  in  1850 %  43,295,604 

Deposits  in  1860 148.546.876 

Deposits  in  1870 547.161,699 

Deposits  in  1881 787,433,993 

Reducing  all  this  to  a  gold  standard  to  be  fully  accu- 
rate, and  we  have: 

Amount  of  de-  Increase  each 

posits,  gold  10  years  in 

Year.                                                         value.  gold. 

1850 $  42, 295, 604      

1860 148,546,876  |106,251,272 

1870 476,030,678  327,48:3,802 

1881...   787  43-993  311,402,311 

From  the  foregoing  it  can  be  seen  that  the  increase  of 
deposits  in  these  savings  banks,  at  gold  values,  was  more 
than  three  times  greater  under  the  first  ten  years  of  pro- 
tection than  it  was  in  the  so-called  free  trade  10  years. 

In  34  years  of  free  trade,  so  says  the  Neivs,  a  Detroit  free 
trade  paper,  the  increase  of  deposits  in  all  the  savings 
banks  of  Great  Britain  has  been  $350,000,000.  In  21 
years  of  protection  in  the  United  States  these  deposits 
have  increased  $628,000,000  in  nine  States. 


14i  Wages  and  Protection. 

The  Rhode  Island  savings  banks  in  1882  had  112,472 
depositors,  and  those  of  Connecticut  225,366 — or  about 
one-tliird  of  the  pojiuhition.  The  total  deposits  in  these 
two  manufacturing  States  was  1134,000,000.  It  is  a 
significant  fact  that  the  amount  of  deposits  and  the  num- 
ber of  dei)Ositors  is  largest  in  manufacturing  sections, 
showing  that  the  operatives  are  saving  money. 

Hon.  W.  A.  Russell,  M.  C. ,  of  Massachusetts,  in  a  Con- 
gressional speech  in  April,  1882,  made  the  following  com- 
jiarisou,  wliich  shows  the  ability  of  American  operatives 
to  live  l)etter,  as  they  do,  than  the  English,  and  yet 
to  put  in  hank  seven  times  as  much  money  to  their 
numbers  as  is  deposited  by  English  workmen  in  Man- 
Chester. 

"  Loweii  has  a  population  of  60,000,  the  largest  in  the  State  or 
in  the  United  States  wholly  engaged  in  the  manufacture  of  tex- 
tile fabrics,  and  therefore  well  illustrates  the  condition  of  the 
industrial  classes  in  our  New  England  manufacturing  centres. 

"  Of  the  60,000  inhabitants  22,559  are  employed  in  the  various 
corporations  and  mills.  There  are  six  savings  banks,  Avith  a  total 
deposit  of  111,646,212  to  the  credit  of  83,408  depositors."  Of  this 
number  1,735  are  depositors  of  amounts  above  $300,  and  31,673 
depositors  of  $300  and  under,  showing  how  general  the  habit  of 
saving  has  become  among  our  people,  and  what  a  large  propor- 
tion of  the  funds  in  the  savings  banks  are  the  earnings  of  the 
wage  laborers.  I  have  it  from  authority  that  fully  seven-eights  of 
the  depos!  s  in  these  savings  banks  are  the  laid-by  earnings  of  the 
wage  laborers. 

"In  Lawrence,  with  a  population  of  40,000,  gi'own  up  wholly 
out  of  manufacturing  and  now  supported  by  it,  there  are  13,000 
operatives,  three  savings  banks  with  $5,000,000  deposits,  and 
13,728  depositors. 

"Manchester,  England,  corresponds  with  these  two  cities  in  its 
occupations,  more  nearly  than  any  other:  With  a  population 
of  341,508,  it  has  in  its  various  savings   banks  £1,434,140  or 


Wages  and  Protection.  145 

$6,883,872 ;  a  city  throe  and  a  half  times  as  large  as  Lowell  and 
Lawrence,  and  less  than  one-half  the  amount  of  deposits  in  its 
savings  institutions. " 

woman's  elevation. 

In  this  whole  protective  question  the  interest  of  woman 
is  really  as  great  as  that  of  man,  and  in  a  day  when  so 
much  thought  is  given  to  her  elevation  this  should  be 
borne  in  mind.  Every  woman  should  be  a  protectionist, 
for  free  trade  degrades  her  even  more  than  it  does  man. 
In  this  country  her  wages  are  quite  as  much  above  the  Brit- 
ish level  as  his.  The  lower  wages  of  the  English  workman 
drive  wife  and  children  into  the  factory,  and  thus  deprive 
the  children  of  a  home  atmosphere  and  a  mother's  care. 
In  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  in  1870,  there  were  six 
males  to  one  female  engaged  in  agricultural  labor,  in  the 
United  States,  fourteen  to  one.  In  Great  Britain  and 
Ireland  the  proportion  of  men  to  Avomcn,  in  manufact- 
uring, mechanical  and  mining  industries,  was  two  to 
one,  in  this  country  seven  to  one.  The  proportion  of 
children  under  sixteen  is  four  times  greater  there  than 
here.  The  larger  pay  of  our  factory  workmen  enables 
the  mother  to  be  in  her  liome,  where  her  children 
need  her  in  their  tender  years.  For  girls,  or  mar- 
ried women  who  choose  factory  work,  the  pay  is  bet- 
ter, and  a  more  self-respecting  and  womanly  life  possible. 
Of  course  equal  pay  for  equal  work  is  justice,  and  usage 
does  not  give  that  to  woman,  nor  does  jirotection  directly 
reach  or  change  that  usage,  but  it  helps  to  better  pay 
than  free  trade,  and  that  is  a  lever  to  open  the  way  to 
all  else.  In  Massachusetts  mills  and  shops  women  earned 
130,000,000  in  1875,  averaging  over  $300  each  in  the 
year. 

^  10 


146  Wages  and  Protection. 

The  following  is  from  the  New  York  Sun  : 

Editor  of  the  bUN — Sir :  I  found  this  advertisement  in  ihe 
Dublin  Freeman's  Journal  of  the  IStli  inst. : 

WANTED — Strong,  humble  girl  to  assist  in  minding  children  and  go  of 
messages;  age  15;  8s  per  quarter.  Apply  at  59  Hareourt  St.,  11  o'clock  to  2, 
Monday. 

For  minding  the  children  and  running  on  errands  the  "strong, 
humble  girl "  will  receive  $8  a  year,  or  67  cents  a  month.  Happy 
land! 

B.  F.  F. 

New  Yokk,  February  20,  1882. 

Consnl-General  Shaw,  in  his  report  from  Manchester, 
referring  to  the  successful  efforts  recently  made  by 
English  ladies  to  encourage  English  manufactured 
goods  to  the  exclusion  of  the  foreign,  which  had  for 
some  time  destroyed  tlie  fashionable  use  of  alpaca  goods 
of  Bradford  make,  reads  American  ladies  tlie  following 
instructive  protective  lecture  : 

"It  may  be  worthy  of  consideration  how  far  American  ladies 
can  foster  and  develop  American  manufactures  by  similar 
patriotic  and  national  action  in  our  own  country.  The  field  for 
such  wise  and  peaceful  revolu^iin  is  a  wide  and  rich  one,  and 
consid^'rate  co-operation  among  our  representative  social  leaders 
would  have  a  powerful  influence  in  creating  a  demand  for  .special 
lines  of  American  dress  goc  ds.  It  is  high  time  American  ladies 
should  set  Anierican  fashions  and  cease  to  follow  the  lead  of 
foreign  fasldon  makers  beyond  the  sea  !" 


WAGES    IN"    NEWARK     AND     PAISLEY — IN     THE     CLYDE 
SHIP-YAEDS. 

To  (he  Editor  of  the  New  TorTc  Tribune : 

Sra  :  Referring  to  the  letter  from  Mr.  Porter  which  appeared 
in  last  Sunday's  Tnbune,  we  would  be  obliged  by  your  publish- 
ing the  following  table  received  from  Clark  &  Co.  by  cable  to-day, 
showing  the  actual  average  wages  paid  by  them  in  Paisley,  Scot- 


Wages  and  Protection.  147 


Weekly  Wag^es  in  Newark. 

C'op-%\-inders ,  — $8.00 

Finishers 5.50 

Reelers .' 8.00 

Spoolers 8.00 

Foremen 20.00 

Pickers V.OO 

Hank-winders '     7.00 


land,  with  which  table  we  unite  the  wages  we  pay  for  the  same 
work  in  Newark,  New  Jersey.     These  facts  require  no  comment : 

Weekly  Wages  in  Paisley. 

Cop-winders 14s.  or  $3. 50 

Finishers 10s.  or     2.50 

Reelers l"s.  or    4.25 

Spoolers I3s.  or    3.35 

Foremen .28s.  or     7.00 

Pickers 16s.  6d.  or    4.12 

Hank-winders 15s.  or    3.75 

Clark  Thre.yd  Co., 

By  William  Clark,  Treasurer. 

New  York,  January,  25, 1883. 

Kobert  P.  Porter  writes  the  Neiv  York  Tnhune  that 
he  found  that  the  pay-roll  of  one  of  the  leading  Clyde 
ship-yards  contained  the  names  of  1,600  men  during 
the  last  two  weeks  of  November,  including  foremen  and 
apprentices,  and  that  the  amount  it  called  for  was 
£4,000,  or  £2,000  per  week.  This  gave  an  average  for 
each  man  of  $6.25  a  week.  The  average  pay  of  skilled 
workmen  was  $7.50  a  week,  and  that  of  unskilled 
laborers  $2.50  a  week.  The  census  returns  of  the 
United  States  show  that  in  1880  there  was  paid  out  for 
wages  in  all  kinds  of  shijj-building  in  this  country 
$12,800,000,  whicli  was  divided  among  21,330  hands, 
giving  eacli  about  $600  per  annum,  or  nearly  twice  as 
much  as  is  paid  on  the  Clyde. 

Mr.  Carroll  D.  Wright,  Chief  of  the  Bureau  of  Sta- 
tistics of  Labor  of  Massachusetts,  states  that  the  weekly 
earnings  of  a  Massachusetts  weaver  are  Q;^^  per  cent, 
greater  than  the  weekly  earnings  of  a  weaver  in 
England. 

Hon.  Jonathan  Chace,  from  Rhode  Island,  a  practical 
business  man  in  cotton  manufacture,  estimates  the  pay  of 
our  cotton  mill  operatives  about  62  per  cent,  above  that 
of  England,  and  sharply  controverts  the  statement  made 


14:8  Wages  and  Protection. 

by  Mr.  Wright  as  to  the  comparative  weekly  earnings 
here  and  there. 

Mr.  Wm.  C.  Wyckoff,  secretary  of  the  Silk  Associa- 
tion of  America,  estimates  that  the  average  wages  paid 
in  the  manufacture  of  silk  goods  in  the  United  States- 
are  about  100  per  cent,  greater  than  in  England. 

J.   W.  HINTON. 

In  an  address  before  the  Wisconsin  Legislature,  at 
Madison,  in  1881,  John  W.  Hinton,  of  Milwaukee, 
alluding  to  the  charge  that  factories  were  monopo- 
lies and  oppressors  of  labor,  cited  the  North  Chicago 
Rolling  Mill  Company,  "which  will  pay  out  in  1881 
13,000,000  in  wages  to  workingmen.  The  president  of 
that  company,  0.  W.  Potter,  said,  when  addressing  the 
iron  and  steel  makers  at  Pittsbutg,  in  May,  1879  :  '  Pay 
your  laborers  well,  and  by  your  exhibition  of  faith  in 
them  you  will  always  get  faithful  services  from  them.' 
Not  very  long  since  a  prominent  free  trade  member  of 
Parliament,  Mr.  Huskisson,  asserted  publicly  :  '  To  give 
capital  a  fair  remuneration,  the  price  of  labor  must  be 
kept  down.'  The  London  Times  declared  that  in 
England  'manhood  became  a  drug  and  population  a 
nuisance.'  But  Potter  said  to  that  meeting  in  Pitts- 
burg :  '  Every  man  of  you  have  more  or  less  men  in 
your  employ  who  know  much  more  about  many  details 
of  your  business  than  you  do,  and  who  in  a  quiet  way 
save  their  salaries  every  day  ;  and  these  men  you  know 
and  have  confidence  in,  and  would  and  do  entrust  them 
with  your  property.'  By  a  tariff  jDrotecting  American 
labor  you  make  the  artisan,  as  a  citizen,  a  safer  deposi- 
tory of  the  franchise  than  though  abject  dependence 
or  gaunt  poverty  grimly  shadowed  his  every  footstep."' 


Wages  and  Protection.  149 

He  also  alluded  to  the  monthly  payment,  at  Bay  View 
Iron  Mills,  Milwaukee,  of  $70,000  in  Avages,  at  rates 
over  50  per  cent,  above  those  paid  in  England. 

COMPABATIVE   TAXATION. 

The  excessive  taxation  of  the  working  man  by  tariffs, 
•&c.,  is  often  spoken  of  by  free  traders.  Mr.  Greg,  an  emi- 
nent Englishman,  estimates  that  the  English  working 
classes  are  taxed  by  tariffs  and  excise  taxes  twenty-six 
shillings,  or  $6.50  yearly.  Mr.  Leffingwell,  an  Ameri- 
can, writing  in  the  Contemjjorary  Eevietv,  London, 
makes  the  tax  on  an  American  of  the  same  class  in  like 
manner  $3  per  year.  Such  estimates  only  approximate  to 
accuracy,  but  show  the  assertions  to  be  groundless.  The 
legislation  of  this  country  is  not  perfect  by  any  means, 
but  it  favors  the  people  in  its  tariffs  and  taxes,  more 
than  that  of  England  or  of  other  lands. 

STATEMENTS    AT    NATIONAL     TAKIFF    CONVENTIONS    AT 
CHICAGO   AND    NEW   YORK. 

In  November,  1882,  Tariff  Conventions  were  held, 
first  in  Chicago  and  then  in  New  York  a  fortnight 
later.  Both  were  national  in  character,  their  members 
representing  many  industries  and  coming  from  the  East 
^nd  West  and  South.  Some  200  delegates  were  at 
Chicago  and  over  600  at  New  York.  An  interesting 
part  of  their  proceedings  was  the  brief  statements  of  the 
condition  of  each  industry.  In  this  connection  such  as 
related  to  labor  are  partly  given. 

The  Chicago  statements  are  first  in  order.  Mr.  E.  S. 
Hartshorn,  of  Troy,  New  York,  spoke  of  flax-spinning  : 

"lam  engaged  in  flax-spinning,  and  with  that  business,  as  it 
exists  at  present  here  and  in  Europe,  I  am  quite  familiar.  The  labor 
for  which  we  pay  $100,000  annually  can  be  had  in  Great  Britain 


150  Wages  and  Protectio7\. 

for  $40,000,  Are  not  the  farmers  surrounding  our  village,  and 
the  merchants,  artisans,  doctors,  lawyers,  boarding  house  keepers, 
house  owners,  &c.,  better  off  with  $100,000  paid  to  the  operatives 
in  our  works  than  if  only  $40,000  were  paid  ?" 

Mr.  Stowell,  of  Appleton,  Wisconsin: 

"Mr.  President,  I  represent  the  paper  interest,  and  our  machin- 
ery chews  up  a  great  many  jute  butts  and  much  tow  flax  every 
year.  For  our  machine  tenders,  as  they  are  technically  called, 
the  men  that  tend  the  machinery  that  runs  off  the  paper,  who 
receive  in  England  five  dollars  and  eighty  cents  a  week,  Germany, 
three  dollars,  we  pay  fifteen  dollars  a  week.  Rag  engine  men 
are  paid  in  England  five  dollars  and  eighty  cents,  we  pay  thirteen 
dollars  and  a  half  a  week.  Bleachers  are  paid  four  dollars  and 
thirty-five  cents  in  England,  and  we  pay  nine  dollars.  Young- 
boys  and  girls  that  attend  to  the  paper  as  it  comes  off  the  ma- 
chine, cutter-hands  they  are  called,  who  cut  and  fold  it,  are 
paid  in  England  two  dollars  and  a  half  a  week,  and  we  pay  four 
dollars  and  a  half.  The  rag-pickers,  girls  who  pick  over  and  assort 
the  rags,  in  England,  two  dollars  a  week,  and  we  pay  three  dollars." 

The  President: 

"The  pottery  interests  are  represented  here.  Mr.  Laughlin,  of 
East  Liverpool,  Ohio,  and  Mr.  Knowles  are  present." 

Mr.  Knowles: 

"We  represent  the  manufacture  of  earthenware,  and  while  a 
little  selfish,  are  protectionists  on  a  broad  basis,  and  believe  in  pro- 
tecting in  projDortion  as  the  article  produced  represents  labor. 

"We  have  compiled  some  statistics  of  prices  paid  in  our  particu- 
lar branch  in  Europe  compared  with  what  is  paid  here.  The  dif- 
ference is  greater  on  the  articles  that  are  most  used,  which  would 
make  it  really  in  favor  of  the  workman  to  a  still  greater  extent; 
but  the  average  on  all  the  products  will  be  about  one  hundred  and 
fifty  per  cent;  or,  where  they  pay  one  dollar  we  pay  two  dollars 
and  fifty  cents  for  the  same  labor." 

His  table  of  wages,  too  long  to  insert,  is  carefully 
prepared  and  am})ly  makes  good  his  statement  as  to 
"workmen's  pay  in  a  large  industry — far  more  impoz'tant 
than  is  supposed. 


Wages  and  Protection. 


151 


Mr.  Jerome  spoke  of  jute  butts  imported,  and  the 
burning  of  flax  straw  in  Iowa  and  elsewhere : 

"I  have  a  superintendent  who  has  been  in  India  very  recently, 
and  he  gives  me  the  facts.  The  very  jute  butts  that  are  handled 
there  at  fourteen  cents  a  day  are  brought  over  here  as  ballast,  and 
pay  a  duty  of  a  little  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  cent  a  pound.  That 
is  the  competition  that  the  grangers  have  to  contend  with,  and 
that  is  why  he  wants  a  duty  on  jute  butts;  and  he  will  have  to 
burn  his  flax  until  that  duty  comes.  And  instead  of  one  hundred 
and  forty  thousand  tons  destroyed,  there  is  more  than  five  hundred 
thousand  raised,  and  more  than  four  himdred  and  fifty  thousand 
tons  burned  and  rotted  and  wasted  when  it  should  be  used  to- 
day." 

Mr.  Shuman,  of  Indiana,  sent  by  three  hundred  work- 
ingmen,  deckired  himself  a  protectionist  and  said  he  was 
highly  jileased  with  the  sayings  and  acts  of  the  conven- 
tion. 

NEW   YOKK   CONVENTION. 

At  the  New  York  Tariff  Convention  like  statements 
were  made. 

Alexander  H.  Jones,  of  Philadelphia,  a  well-known 
manufacturer  of  chemicals,  reported  as  follows: 

"  Here  are  some  figures  as  to  daily  wages  paid  in  a  Philadelphia 
factory  and  at  St.  Helen's,  England,  in  a  like  establishment: 


Acid  makers 

Firemen 

Ordinary  laborers 
Furnace  men  .... 

Bricklayers 

Carpenters 

Stone  masons 

Fitters 

Blacksmiths 


America. 

England. 

Difference. 

$            1  50 

$1  08 

s 

42 

2  00 

1  44 

56 

1  :i3 

84 

4» 

2  00 

1  44 

5a 

2  50@3  00 

2  16 

34@»4 

2  2.5 

1  40 

85 

2  75 

1  92 

&3 

2  75 

1  44 

1  31 

3  00 

1  20 

1  80 

152  Wages  and  Protection. 

"Compare  this  difference  with  the  total  amount  of  wages  paid  by 
our  chemical  industry  in  the  census  year  and  it  shows  an  excess  of 
$7,554,900,  paid  in  wages  to 29,405  American  hands,  over  English 
wages  for  the  same  work." 

G.  B.  Stebbins,  of  Detroit,  reported  oyer  50,000  men 
employed  in  Michigan  lumber  camps,  saw  mills  and  salt 
works,  at  wages  over  twenty-five  per  cent,  higher  tlian 
are  paid  just  across  the  lake  and  river  in  Canada.  These 
wages  aggregate  $25,000,000  yearly  or  15,000,000  more 
than  Canadians  pay  for  the  same  work. 

In  Michigan  iron  ore  beds  and  copper  mines  and 
works  on  Lake  Superior,  15,000  workmen  get  two  dol- 
lars a  day,  double  European  pay.  The  yearly  amount  of 
their  earnings  is  $9,000,000;  excess  over  European  earn- 
ings $4,500,000. 

JOHN"   JAKRETT — PETER   COOPER. 

At  a  large  labor  protection  meeting  in  Cooper  Insti- 
tute, New  York,  Feb.  25th,  1883,  under  the  auspices 
of  associations  of  working  men,  John  Jarrett,  of  Pitts- 
burgh, President  Amalgamated  Association  of  Iron  and 
Steel  Workers,  and  others  spoke.  From  Mr.  Jarrett's 
address  a  paragraph  must  suffice  : 

"Now  it  happens  I  was  born  on  the  other  side  of  the  water, 
and  I  am  pretty  well  conversant  with  the  methods  of  living  there, 
and  I  know  pretty  well  what  free  trade  has  done  for  that  country. 
The  difference  in  ratio  of  prices  at  which  they  have  to  sell  their 
products  in  England  and  the  prices  in  this  country  is  largely  in 
our  favor.  The  puddler  receives  as  his  standard  wages  all 
through  the  north  of  England  7  shillings  6  pence  a  ton,  while  here 
our  men  receive  about  $5.50.  There  he  receives  but  one-twentieth 
of  the  price  that  commodity  brings  in  the  market ;  and  our  men 
receive  $5.50  for  that  same  iron  that  brings  on  the  market  $56  ;  in 
other  words,  we  get  $5. 50  for  our  puddler,  and  the  manufacturer 


Wcujes  and  Protectioix.  153 

^ets  $56,  and  the  English  puddler  gets  only  $2  out  of  $35.  You 
«ee,  then,  how  largely  it  is  in  favor  of  our  men,  and  the  ratio 
•carries  itself  all  the  way  through." 

The  venerable  philantliropisi  Peter  Cooper  sent  a  letter 
to  the  meeting,  a  valuable  sentence  of  which  is  given: 

"I  have  noticed  in  my  own  business  life,  extending  over  a 
period  of  nearly  seventy  years,  that  every  reduction  of  the  tariff 
(or  '  the  tariff  for  revenue  only '  plan)  has  brought  wretchedness 
and  ruin.  It  is  the  natural  effect  from  such  a  cause.  Nothing 
is  more  certain  than  that  the  advocacy  of  free  trade  comes  from 
foreigners  who  want  to  break  up  our  industries.  They  have  done 
it  several  times  already,  and  they  want  to  do  it  again.  The 
laborers  of  the  Old  World  get  barely  enough  to  keep  body  and 
soul  together,  and  that  is  the  condition  in  which  the  advocates  of 
free  trade  are  trying  to  place  our  laborers,  and  it  behooves  every 
man  to  do  all  he  can  to  deter  Congress  from  the  endeavor." 

A  resolution  was  adopted  Avith  hearty  unanimity,  call- 
ing on  the  people  "  to  preserve  a  tariff  that  protects 
living  wages." 

This  chapter  may  fitly  close  with  the  testimony  of 
the  New  York  correspondent  of  the  London  Iron- 
monger, who  is  instructed  to  investigate  the  iron  trade 
in  America  and  report  to  this  English  journal  for  their 
information.  In  the  Ironmonger  of  October  9th,  1881, 
he  makes  this  plain  and  forcible  statement : 

"  The  plain  truth  of  tJie  matter  is  that  about  all  that  protection 
protects  is  labor.  With  the  same  rates  of  wages  there  are  but  few 
things  produced  here  at  all  which  could  not  be  produced  in  the 
United  States  as  cheaply  as  in  England.  The  chief  advantage  of 
protection  is  that  it  enables  the  workingman  to  live  a  great  deal 
better  than  his  English  competitor,  by  making  his  labor  more 
valuable.  The  manufacturers  say  they  would  suffer  from  the 
withdrawal  of  protection  chiefly  through  the  lowered  ability  of 
the  masses  of  the  people  to  consume ;  but  that,  so  far  as  the  cost 
of  production  is  concerned,  they  could  meet  any  competition  with 
their  improved  machinery,  and  with  labor  as  cheap  as  it  icouUl  be 
under  free  trade.'' 


CHAPTER  XI. 

OPINIONS  AND  STATEMENTS  OP  EMINENT  MEN. 

The  necessity  of  a  protective  system  for  the  States  was; 
a  main  subject  of  deliberation  at  the  first  convention,  in 

1786,  of  delegates  at  Annapolis,  met  to  consider  the  for- 
mation of  a  Constitution,  and  also  at  the  convention  of 

1787,  in  which  the  Constitution  was  framed. 
Washington,  as  President,  met  the  first  Congress  clad 

in  a  suit  of  domestic  manufacture,  and  the  second  Act 
jxissed  by  that  Congress  had  the  following  preamble; 

"  Whereas,  It  is  necessary  for  the  support  of  Government,  for 
the  discharge  of  the  debts  of  the  United  States,  and  for 
the  encouragement  and  protection  of  manufactures,  that  duties 
be  laid  on  goods,  wares  and  merchandise  imported.  Be  it. 
enacted,"  etc.,  etc. 

This  bill  was  signed  by  Washington,  July  4,  1789. 
Jefferson,  made  President  by  a  rival  party,  was  too  broad 
in  his  views  to  differ  from  Washington  on  this  great 
question.     In  his  second  message,  he  said: 

"To  cultivate  peace,  and  maintain  commerce  and  navigation 
in  all  their  lawful  enterprises,  to  foster  our  fisheries,  as  nurseries, 
of  navigation  and  for  the  nurture  of  man,  and  to  protect  the 
manufactures  adapted  to  our  circumstances — these  are  the  land- 
marks by  which  we  are  to  guide  ourselves." 

President  Madison's  special  message.  May  23,  1809: 
"  The  revision  of  our  commercial  laws,  proper  to  adapt  them  to- 
the  arrangement  which  has  taken  place  with  Great  Britain,  will 
doubtless  engage  the  early  attention  of  Congress.  It  will  be- 
worthy  at  the  same  time  of  their  just  and  provident  care  to  make 
such  alteration  in  tlie  laics  as  tcill  especially  protect  and  foster  tlie- 
several  branches  of  manufacture." 

154 


Statements  of  Eminent  Men.  155 

Benjamin  Franklin: 

"  Every  manufacturer  encouraged  in  our  country  makes  part  of 
a  market  for  provisions  within  ourselves  and  saves  so  much  money 
to  this  country  as  must  otherwise  be  exported  for  the  manufactures 
he  supplies." 

Andrew  Jackson,  December  7th,  1830,  Second  Annual 
Message  as  President  of  the  United  States  : 

' '  The  power  to  impose  duties  on  imports  originally  belonged  to 
the  several  States.  The  right  to  adjust  these  duties  with  a  view 
to  the  encouragement  of  domestic  branches  of  industry  is  so  com- 
pletely identical  with  that  power  that  it  is  difficult  to  suppose  the 
existence  of  the  one  without  the  other.  The  States  have  dele- 
gated their  whole  authority  over  imports  to  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment without  limitation  or  restriction,  saving  the  very  inconsider- 
able restriction  relating  to  their  inspection  laws.  This  authority 
having  thus  entirely  passed  from  the  States,  the  right  to  exercise 
it  for  the  purpose  of  protection  does  not  exist  in  them  ;  and  con- 
sequently if  it  be  not  possessed  by  the  General  Government  it 
must  be  extinct.  Our  political  system  would  thus  present  the 
anomaly  of  a  people  stripped  of  the  right  to  foster  their  own 
industry  and  to  counteract  the  most  selfish  and  destructive  policy 
which  might  be  adopted  by  foreign  nations.  This  surely  cannot 
be  the  case  ;  this  indispensable  power  thus  surrendered  by  the 
States  must  be  within  the  scope  of  the  authority  on  the  subject 
expressly  delegated  to  Congress. 

"  In  this  conclusion  I  am  confirmed  as  well  by  the  opinions  of 
Presidents  Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  and  Monroe,  who 
have  each  repeatedly  recommended  the  exercise  of  this  right 
under  the  Constitution,  as  by  the  uniform  practice  of  Congress, 
the  continued  acqinescence  of  the  States,  and  the  general  under- 
standing of  the  people." 

President  J.  Q.  Adams'  Fonrtli  Annual  Message,. 
December  2,  1828  : 

"  The  great  interests  of  an  agricultural,  commercial,  and  manu- 
facturing nation,  are  so  linked  in  union  together  that  no  perma- 
nent cause  of  prosperity  to  one  of  tliem  can  operate  without 
extending  its  influence  to  the  others.     All  these  interests  are  alike- 


156  Statements  of  Eininent  Men. 

under  the  protecting  power  of  legislative  authority,  and  the  duties 
of  the  representative  bodies  are  to  conciliate  them  in  harmony 
together. " 

Henry  Clay,  speech  in  the  House  of  Representatives, 
March  30  and  31,  1824: 

"  The  proposition  to  be  maintained  by  our  adversaries  is,  that 
manufactures,  without  protection,  will,  in  due  time,  spring  up  in 
the  country  and  sustain  themselves,  in  competition  with  foreign 
fabrics,  however  advanced  the  arts  and  whatever  the  degree  of 
protection  may  be  in  foreign  countries.  Now,  I  contend  that  this 
proposition  is  refuted  by  all  experience,  ancient  and  modern,  in 
eveiy  country.  If  I  am  asked  why  improtected  industry  should 
not  succeed  in  a  struggle  with  protected  industry,  I  answer,  the 
fact  has  ever  been  so,  and  that  is  sufficient;  I  reply  that  uniform 
experience  evinces  that  it  cannot  succeed  in  such  a  struggle,  and 
that  is  sufficient.  If  we  speculate  on  the  causes  of  this  universal 
truth,  we  may  differ  about  them.  Still  the  indisputable  fact 
remains." 

Henry  Clay,  speech  in  United  States  Senate,  Feb.  2,  3 
and  6,  1832: 

"In  short,  sir,  if  I  were  to  select  any  term  of  seven  years  since 
the  adoption  of  the  present  Constitution  which  exhibited  a  scene 
of  the  most  wide  spread  dismay  and  desolation,  it  would  be  exactly 
that  term  of  seven  years  which  immediately  preceded  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  tariff  of  1824." — "  If  the  term  of  seven  years  were 
to  be  selected  of  the  greatest  prosperity  which  this  people  have 
enjoyed  since  the  establishment  of  their  present  Constitution,  it 
would  be  exactly  that  period  of  seven  years  which  immediately 
followed  the  passage  of  the  tariff  of  1824." — "And  is  the  fact  not 
indisputable,  that  all  essential  objects  of  consumption  affected  by 
the  tariff  are  cheaper  and  better  since  the  act  of  1824,  than  they 
■were  for  several  years  prior  to  that  law?  Let  us  look  into  some 
particulars.  The  total  consumption  of  bar  iron  in  the  United 
States  is  supposed  to  be  about  146,000  tons,  of  which  112,866  tons 
are  made  within  the  country,  and  the  residue  imported.  The 
measure  of  protection  extended  to  this  necessary  article  was  never 
adequate  until  the  passage  of  the  act  of  1828;  and  what  has  been 
the  consequence?    The  annual  increase  of  quantity,  since  that 


Statements  of  Eminent  Men.  157 

period,  has  be«i  in  the  ratio  of  near  25  per  cent.,  and  the  whole 
sale  price  of  bar  iron  in  the  Northern  cities  w;i.s,  in  1828,  $105  per 
ton;  in  1829,  $100;  in  1830,  $90;  and  in  1831.  from  $85  to  $75— 
constantly  diminishing. " 

Daniel  Webster,  speecli  at  mass  meeting  at  Albany^ 
August  27,  1844: 

"  The  term  (protection)  was  well  understood  in  our  colonial  his- 
tory, and  if  we  go  back  to  the  history  of  the  Constitution,  and  of 
the  convention  which  adopted  it,  we  shall  find  that  everywhere, 
when  masses  of  men  were  assembled,  and  the  wants  of  the  people 
were  brought  forth  into  prominence,  the  idea  was  held  up  that 
domestic  industry  could  not  prosper,  manufactures  and  the 
mechanic  arts  could  not  advance,  the  condition  of  the  common 
country  could  not  be  carried  up  to  any  considerable  elevation, 
unless  there  should  be  one  government,  to  lay  one  rate  of  duty 
upon  imports  throughout  the  Union,  from  New  Hampshire  to 
Georgia;  regard  to  be  had,  in  laying  this  duty,  to  the  protection  of 
American  labor  and  industry.  I  defy  the  man  in  any  degree  con- 
versant with  history,  in  any  degree  acquainted  with  the  annals  of 
this  country  from  1787  to  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution  in  1789, 
to  say  that  this  was  not  a  leading,  I  may  almost  say  the  leading, 
motive.  South  as  well  as  North,  for  the  formation  of  the  new  gov. 
ernment.  Without  that  provision  in  the  Constitution  it  never 
could  have  been  adopted." 

Jolin  M.  Berrien,  United  States  Senator  from  Georgia, 
in  1843  •. 

"1.  The  credit  of  the  government  was  prostrate,  and  has  been 
redeemed.  Its  stock  is  again  above  par.  3.  The  treasury  was 
empty  ;  it  is  now  replenished.  3.  The  commerce  and  navigation 
of  the  country  have  increased.  4.  Its  agricultural  condition  has 
improved.  5.  There  has  been  a  marked  improvement  of  our 
great  staple  (cotton).  6.  A  reduction  in  the  prices  of  almost  all, 
if  not  absolutely  of  every  article  of  consumption.  7.  To  crown 
the  whole,  every  branch  of  industry  has  been  stimulated  to 
increased  activity,  and  confidence  has  been  restored.  These 
things,  I  apprehend,  are  true.  The  tariff  of  1842  has  been  in 
efficient  operation  but  little  more  than  a  year,  and  these  effects, 
have  followed. " 


158  Statements  of  Eminent  Men. 

Horace  G-reeley,  Essays  on  Political  Economy,  1869, 
disposes  of  the  "monopoly"  absurdity  in  a  terse  and 
plain  way,  as  follows: 

"But  with  what  reason,  with  what  justice,  does  one  say  that 
an  impost  or  tax  on  imported  iron  or  nails,  clofli  or  cutlery,  cre- 
ates a  monopoly  ?  A  great  many  of  our  countrymen  were  pre- 
viously employed  in  making  these  articles.  In  what  sense  is  a 
•monopoly  accorded  to  any  or  the  whole  of  them  together  ?  Do  we 
not  know  that,  not  only  will  each  of  them  sell  as  his  own  interest 
prompts,  and  increase  his  product  so  fast  and  so  far  as  he  can  do 
so  with  profit,  but  that  any  one  else  who  will  may  embark  in  the 
business  whenever  he  shall  see  fit  ?  How  can  A  have  had  conferred 
on  him  by  law  a  monopoly  of  that  which  B,  C,  D,  and  all  the 
rest  of  the  alphabet,  are  not  only  at  perfect  liberty  to  embark  in 
whenever  they  will,  but  which  this  very  act  strongly  tends  to 
invite  them  to  engage  in,  having  been  passed  for  that  express  pur- 
pose ?" 

Henry  C.  Carey,  Principles  of  Social  Science  : 
"The  laborer  must  sell  his  potential  energies,  be  they  what 
ihey  may,  or  perish  for  want  of  food.  In  regard  to  no  com- 
modity, therefore,  is  the  effect  resulting  from  the  presence  or 
absence  of  competition  so  great  as  in  relation  to  human  force. 
Two  men  competing  for  its  purchase,  its  owner  becomes  a  free 
man.  The  two  competing  for  its  sale  become  enslaved.  The 
whole  question  of  freedom  or  slavery  for  man  is,  therefore, 
embraced  in  that  of  competition." — "  A  bushel  of  corn  is  worih  as 
much  in  Illinois  or  Iowa  as  in  the  neighborhood  of  Paris  or  of 
London  ;  and  the  sole  reason  why  it  sells  for  onlj'  a  fourth  or  a 
fifth  as  much  is,  that  the  farmer  is  burdened  with  the  cost  of  send- 
ing it  to  market.  Bring  the  market  to  him  by  opening  the  great 
coal  and  ore  deposits  of  Indiana  and  Illinois,  Missouri  and  Michi- 
gan, and  then  not  only  will  he  be  relieved  of  the  necessity  for  look- 
ing to  distant  markets,  but  it  will  become  impossible  for  him  to  sup- 
ply them,  because  the  price  at  home  will  be  on  a  level  with  that 
abroad.  The  change  thus  effected  would  count  to  the  farmers  of 
the  country  to  the  extent  of  many  hundreds  of  millions  of  dol- 
lars, and  at  no  distant  day  it  would  be  reckoned  by  thousands  of 
millions." 


Statements  of  Eminent  Men.  159 

M,  Thiers,  speech  in  the  Corps  Legislatif,  Paris,  Janu- 
ary 26,  1870. 

"  France  has  her  consumers  within  herself.  Her  market  does 
not  depend  upon  a  cannon-shot  fired  in  Europe.  And  for  expor- 
tation she  has  her  beautiful  products.  England  on  the  contrary, 
has  an  artificial  existence.  She  depends  upon  the  doings  of  the 
United  States ;  upon  the  doings  of  her  colonies,  which  already 
oppose  her  with  hostile  tariffs.  May  not  the  day  come  when  her 
immense  production  will  find  no  purchasers?  She  produces  ten 
times  as  much  as  her  consumption !  This  little  island,  in  the  words 
of  Fox,  embraces  the  world.  True;  but  when  she  embraces  the 
world  she  is  vulnerable  everywhere. 

"  Such  was  the  situation  of  Holland  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
which  had  realized  a  prodigy  almost  as  marvelous.  What  was 
needed  to  make  Holland,  which  gave  laws  to  France,  descend  from 
this  lofty  place?  It  needed  only  fifty  years.  It  needed  only  a 
Navigation  Act  in  England;  it  needed  only  a  Colbert  in  France. 

"God  forbid  that  I  should  predict  for  England  such  a  destiny; 
but,  I  repeat  it,  her  existence,  which  depends  upon  consumers, 
which  she  seeks  everywhere  without  herself,  is  less  solid  than  that 
of  France,  which  has  her  consumers  in  her  own  bosom." 

E.  B.  Ward,  Detroit,  Michigan: 

"When  a  nation  fosters  and  protects  its  own  resources  and 
interests  through  its  national  laws,  it  prospers.  If  the  laws  are  so 
framed  as  to  give  other  nations  the  advantage,  either  through  their 
superior  skill,  cheap  labor,  or  cheap  and  abundant  capital,  it  suffers. 
When  a  nation  separates  by  great  distances  the  producers  of  raw 
materials  from  the  consiuners,  the  producers  practically  pay  the 
transportation,  and  become  poor,  while  a  few  forwarders,  traders, 
and  carriers  become  rich  at  the  expense  of  the  producer  and  con- 
sumer. When  a  nation  diversifies  its  means  for  the  employment 
and  utilization  of  all  its  laborers,  prosperity  and  wealth  ensue, 
while  the  nation  and  people  who  confine  themselves  principally  to 
one  employment  become  poor  and  dependent." 

David  H.  Mason,  Chicago,  111. : 

"Foreign  producers  are  not  subject  to  our  laws,  nor  amenable 
to  the  processes  of  our  courts,  nor  obligated  to  serve  on  our  juries, 


160  Statements  of  Eminent  Men. 

nor  liable  to  be  drafted  into  our  armies,  nor  bound  to  contribute 
to  our  internal  taxes,  nor  answeral)le  for  non-performance  of  any 
of  the  duties  of  American  citizenship.  They  are  total  aliens  to 
our  national  commonwealth.  •To  permit  them  to  sell  their  mer- 
chandise in  our  home  markets  free  of  all  tariff  charge,  free  of  all 
local  burdens,  and  free  of  all  allegiance  to  our  government,  would 
be  to  exalt  perfect  strangers  above  the  heads  of  its  own  patriotic 
people  in  privilege.*  The  foreigner,  abiding  in  a  distant  land,  and 
often  hostile  at  heart  to  our  republican  institutions,  has  no  right  to 
ask  to  be  placed  on  a  dead  level  of  commercial  benefits  with  our 
citizens,  who  bear  a  round  of  local  burdens  incident  to  those  insti- 
tutions— burdens  from  which  he  is  exempt.  It  has  cost  a  vast 
amount  of  sacrifice,  an  immense  aggregate  of  exertion,  and  an 
incalculable  investment  of  capital,  on  the  part  of  our  population, 
through  a  number  of  generations,  to  transform  a  perfect  wilder- 
ness into  the  most  opulent  and  the  most  desirable  of  the  world's 
markets.  Why  should  the  total  alien,  without  any  participation  |^ 
in  developing  our  resources,  without  sharing  in  the  support  of  our 
government,  without  a  personal  stake  in  the  welfare  of  our  Union, 
be  allowed  to  be  an  exceptiouall}^  favored  beneficiary  of  all  that 
toil  and  effort?  There  is  no  way  in  which  he  can  be  compelled  to 
compensate  our  nationality  for  the  high  privilege  of  admission  to 
our  domestic  markets  except  through  duties  on  imports.  Only  by 
the  imposition  of  such  charges,  made  adequate  to  the  piu'pose,  can 
the  unequal  conditions  of  competition  be  equalized  between  the 
alien  and  the  citizen,  meeting  as  rivals  in  trade  upon  our  soil." 

Joseph  Wharton,  PhiladeljAia,  Pa. : 

"The  old-fashioned  way  of  gaining  population  from  a  neigh- 
boring country  by  invading  it  and  carrying  olT  its  inhabitants  as 
slaves  is  no  longer  practiced  by  civilized  nations,  and  the  acquisi- 
tion of  territory  by  similar  means  is  perhaps  not  so  freqtient  as  it 
once  was,  but  the  newer  style  of  aggrandizement  by  winning  the 
wealth  of  a  neighbor  through  industrial  aosaults  and  trade  inva- 
sions is  now  in  the  fullest  activity. 

"  In  this  modern  and  highly  civilized  style  of  warfare,  improved 
machinery  takes  the  place  of  improved  artillery;  the  enemy's 
forces — his  industrial  population — are  driven  from  their  guns  by 
missiles  of  textiles  and  metal  wares,  and  are  destroyed  in  their 
homes  by  starvation  rather  than  by  bullets  in  the  field. 


Statements  of  Ern'uient  Men.  161 

'It  is  clear  that  the  patriotism  which  cau  sleep  through  this 
industrial  warfare  and  suffer  this  trade  spoliation,  and  can  on!}-  be 
roused  into  activity  by  the  danger  and  passion  of  flagrant  war; 
which  can  vote  the  public  money  to  maintain  rarely  used  armies, 
navies,  and  forts,  but  cannot  give  the  slightest  aid  or  comfort  to 
the  real  and  constant  defenders  of  its  country's  independence — its 
industrial  soldiers — is  a  patriotism  belonging  to  periods  long  gone 
by,  and  is  of  little  more  present  use  than  a  bow  and  arrow.  The 
spirit  of  loyalty  is  forever  the  same,  but  it  must  now  learn  to  pro- 
mote its  conntry's  welfare  by  the  arts  of  peace,  pursuing  its  ancient 
and  honorable  aim  by  the  new  methods." 

Professor  Francis  Bowen,  Harvard  College,  Cam- 
bridge, Mass.  (Political  Economy,  pp.  491-92)  : 

"But  on  this  great  question  between  free  trade  and  protection 
the  arguments  relating  to  pecuniary  loss  and  gain  (important  as 
they  are)  do  not  merit  so  much  notice  as  those  respecting  the  devo- 
tion of  the  greater  part  of  the  people  to  skilled  or  rude  labor. 
*  *  *  Viewed  in  this  light,  the  question  seems  to  be  one 
between  progress  in  civilization  and  the  arts,  or  a  gradual  return, 
I  will  not  say  to  barbarism,  but  to  that  imperfect  stage  of  civiliza- 
tion which  exists  in  all  countries  where  the  people  are  almost 
exclusively  devoted  to  agriculture.  The  best  legislative  policy  is 
that  which  will  most  effectually  develop  all  the  natural  advantages 
of  a  country,  whether  mental  or  material.  It  is  as  wasteful,  to 
say  the  least,  to  allow  mechanical  skill  and  inventive  genius  to 
remain  unemployed,  as  to  permit  water-power  to  run  without  turn- 
ing mill  wheels,  or  minerals  to  remain  in  the  ore,  or  forests  to 
stand  where  cotton  and  grain  might  grow  luxuriantly.  *  *  * 
To  give  full  scope  to  all  varieties  of  taste,  genius,  and  tempera- 
ment ;  to  foster  inventive  talent ;  to  afford  adequate  encourage- 
ment to  all  the  arts,  whether  mechanical  or  those  usually  distin- 
guished as  the  fine  arts  ;  to  concentrate  the  people  *  *  *  with- 
in the  sphere  of  the  humanizing  influences  and  larger  means  of 
mental  culture  and  social  improvement  *  *  *  in  cities  and 
large  towns  ; — these  are  objects  which  deserve  at  least  as  much 
attention  as  the  inquiry  where  we  can  buy  calicoes  cheapest,  or 
how  great  pecuniary  sacrifice  must  be  made  before  we  can  make 
our  own  railroad  iron. 
11 


162  Statements  of  JE)rihient  Men. 

"I  see  not  how  these  ends  can  be  obtained  in  a  country  like 
ours  *  *  *  witliout  throwing  over  our  manufacturing  indus- 
try, at  least  for  half  a  century  to  come,  the  broad  shield  of  an 
effective  protecting  tariff.         ******* 

"A  protective  duty  prevents  agriculture  from  being  so  overdone 
as  to  render  raw  material  the  only  article  of  export,  and  to  depress 
its  price  so  low  that,  though  the  people  have  a  rude  abundance  of 
food  and  other  mere  necessaries,  they  are  deprived  of  most  of  the 
comforts  and  elegancies  of  life  ;  *  *  *  the  cost  of  commodi- 
ties will  be  less  than  if  the  duty  had  not  been  imposed ;  its  gen- 
eral effect  is  to  stimulate  invention,  to  multiply  the  productive 
arts,  and  to  enlarge  the  sources  of  national  opulence." 

John  L.  Hayes,  Cambridge,  Mass.  : 

' '  The  assertion  of  England  that  protective  doctrines  are  opposed 
to  the  philosophical  and  practical  judgment  of  the  present  period, 
is  not  to  be  believed,  because  England  is  deeply  interested  in  mak- 
ing the  world  accept  this  fallacy.  With  her  teeming  and  starving, 
and  now  restless  and  discontented  population,  her  very  existence 
depends  upon  keeping  open  the  foreign  outlets  for  her  manufact- 
ures, and  receiving,  at  cheap  rates,  the  raw  material  of  other 
nations.  By  creating  a  cm^rent  of  sentiment  which  will  tend  to  a 
removal  by  other  nations  of  restrictions  upon  the  entry  of  her 
goods,  she  secures  a  triple  purpose,  the  occupation  of  foreign 
markets,  the  means  of  increasing  the  prices  of  her  goods  by  crush- 
ing out  competing  manufactures,  and  the  cheapening  of  the 
desired  products  of  agriculture,  which  is  sure  to  result  from  the 
abandonment  of  domestic  manufactures  in  all  the  countries  into 
which  her  goods  can  enter  without  restriction.  England  stands 
forth  not  so  much  as  the  great  exemplar,  but  as  the  great  proim- 
gandist  of  free  trade.  To  engraft  this  policy  upon  other  nations, 
is  the  paramount  idea  of  British  statesmanship.  It  governs  all  her 
diplomacy,  is  never  lost  sight  of  in  her  legislation,  and  is  avowed 
by  all  her  ministers.  All  English  literature  is  tinged  by  the  politi- 
cal philosophy  inspired  by  this  idea.  Her  press  reiterates  day  by 
day  its  platitudes  concerning  the  progress  of  liberal  ideas,  and  its 
paradoxes  concerning  the  unselfishness  of  British  commerce,  not 
to  affect  opinion  in  England,  which  is  always  fixed  in  the  direc- 
tion of  interest,  but  to  create  opinion  outside  of  England.  Dur- 
ing the  last  century  an  institution  was  founded  in  England,  under 


Statements  of  Eminent  Men.  163 

the  style  of  "The  Society  for  Propagating  tlie  Gospel  in  Foreign 
Parts,"  whose  practical  benevolence  is  attested  by  many  churches 
still  standing  in  this  countrj^  erected  by  its  funds.  The  great 
missionary  enterprise  to  which  England  of  to-day  is  devoted  is  the 
propagation  in  "foreign  parts"  (especially  in  the  United  States) 
of  the  doctrine  of  a  political  religion, — the  gospel  of  free  trade. 
Its  tracts  are  the  essays  of  British  economists  ;  its  colporteurs,  her 
commercial  traders ;  its  foreign  missionaries,  the  representatives 
of  the  press  of  our  leading  commercial  city  ;  and  its  churches, 
our  bonded  warehouses.  No  influence  which  can  contribute  to 
the  spread  of  this  religion  is  despised  ;  no  accessible  organ  which 
can  affect  opinion  abroad  remains  unsubsidized." 

Stephen  Colwell,  report  as  United  States  Eevenue 
Commissioner,  to  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  1866: 

"The  purchasing  power  of  a  people  who  have  duly  mingled 
manufactures  with  agriculture  is  tenfold  that  of  a  piu'ely  agricul- 
tural community.  They  purchase  of  each  other.  The  population 
of  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  is  not  far  from  thirty  millions 
each,  yet  the  internal  trade  of  the  United  States  is  tenfold  greater  in 
value  than  all  our  foreign  trade,  Great  Britain  included.  The 
strength  and  wealth  of  a  country  should  be  measured  by  the 
quantity  and  value  of  its  own  productions  which  it  consumes, 
and  not  by  what  it  sends  abroad.  Massachusetts  and  Philadel- 
phia contribute  to  the  consumption  of  the  United  States  more  than 
all  Europe;  so  also  the  City  of  New  York  and  New  Jersey.  The 
trade  between  Pennsylvania,  New  Jersey  and  New  York  on  the 
one  side,  and  New  England  on  the  other,  vastly  exceeds  our  trade 
with  Europe.  Like  facts  may  be  found  in  the  statistics  of  every 
Slate  and  county." 

Eobert  E.  Thompson,  Professor  of  Social  Science  and 
Jsational  Economy  in  tlie  University  of  Pennsylvania. 
(Social  Science,  etc. — page  271): 

"Is  it  'natural'  that  any  nation  should  keep  its  farms  on  one 
continent  and  its  workshops  on  another?  Is  it  'natural'  that  cot- 
ton, on  its  way  from  the  grower  to  the  weaver,  should  go 
half  way  round  the  globe  and  back  again?  Is  it  'natural '  that  a 
large  part  of  the  race  should  be   employed  in  carrying  bulky 


164  Statements  of  Eminent  Men. 

articles — raw  materials  and  coarse  goods — from  some  countries  to 
others  in  the  same  climate  r.nd  of  the  same  general  capacity?  Is 
it  '  natm-al '  that  a  country  with  millions  of  tons  of  iron  on  the 
surface  of  her  soil,  and  square  miles  of  coal  not  far  below  it, 
should  send  thousands  of  miles  for  railroad  iron?  *  *  *  Pro- 
tection is  natural  resistance  to  an  unnatural  state  of  things." 

Hon.  W.  D.  Kelley,  M.  C,  in  Congress,  May,  1882  : 

"The  framers  of  our  tariff  regarded  all  forms  of  American 
labor,  and,  placing  a  duty  upon  the  primary  element  of  an  article 
if  of  native  production,  advanced  the  rate  as  the  article  was 
advanced  by  an  increased  expenditure  of  labor. 

"  In  this  they  followed  not  only  the  teachings  of  social  science, 
but  the  example  of  France,  who  still  maintains  many  of  the  pro- 
visions of  her  tariff  law  of  1793.  Her  tariff  from  the  days  of 
Colbert  has  been  a  series  of  graded  duties,  increasing  with  the 
increased  labor  involved  in  each  step  of  the  advancement  of  the 
article.  Let  me  invite  the  attention  of  the  committee  to  the  result 
of  the  industrial  stability  secured  by  this  permanence  of  wisely 
adjusted  rates  of  duty.  Dynasties  have  risen  and  perished  ;  the 
doctrine  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  was  swept  away  by  the 
breath  of  a  new-born  democracy ;  an  empire  subdued  the  vio- 
lence of  this  new-born  giant,  and  restored  monarchy  succeeded  the 
empire.  But,  though  political  revolutions  have  occurred  at  brief 
intervals  throughout  the  century,  the  industries  of  France  have 
been  stable,  the  French  people  have  prospered  and  French  indus- 
try and  art  have  conquered  the  world  by  their  excellence  and  ele- 
gance ;  and  it  is  still  true  that  a  pound  of  cotton  manufactured  in 
Fi-ance,  and  beautified  by  her  cultivated  artisans,  will  pay  for 
scores  of  pounds  of  coarse  and  adulterated  British  fabrics." 

Abraham  Lincoln,  Illinois,  1832: 

"  I  am  in  favor  of  the  internal  improvement  system,  and  a  high 
protective  tariff." 

He  held  the  same  views  all  his  life. 


CHAPTER    XII. 

COMMON  INTEREST  INSTEAD  OF  SECTIONAL 
JEALOUSY. 

The  more  we  study  tlie  interciependence,  intimate 
relations,  and  common  interests  of  different  parts  of  our 
wide  country,  the  more  we  see  the  benefits  of  free  and 
ready  intercourse  and  exchange  of  products  within  our 
borders,  and  of  a  national  protective  policy  beneficial 
alike  to  all. 

In  an  able  speech  in  Chicago,  Hon.  V.  B.  Denslow 
said  :  "  The  United  States  was  the  first  to  establish  per- 
fect free  trade  among  all  the  people  withiji  one  national 
boundary."  France,  as  he  says,  not  abolishing  her 
interior  custom  houses,  until  1793,  and  Germany  not 
until  from  1810  to  1830,  under  the  advice  of  Frederick 
List,  long  a  resident  of  that  country,  an  able  protection- 
ist and  a  disciple  and  friend  of  Matthew  Carey,  of  Phil- 
adelphia. England  had  duties  discriminating  against 
Ireland  up  to  184G. 

It  is  a  new  evidence  of  the  ability  of  the  Fathers  of 
our  country  in  1787  that  they  inaugurated  protection  in 
foreign  commerce  and  free  trade  at  home  at  the  same 
time. 

Free  trade  appeals  to  sectional  Jealousy ;  protection 
builds  up  national  unity.  Fifty  years  ago  Southern  free 
traders  advocated  that  policy  "to  insure  the  British 
market  for  their  cotton,  prevent  Northern  manufactures, 
force  a  large  number  of  Northern  men  into  agriculture, 
multiply  the  growth  and  increase  the  price  of  provisions, 

1C5 


166  Commoji  Interest 

to  feed  and  clothe  their  shives  at  cheaper  rates."  (See 
*'  Cotton  is  King,  pnblished  and  sold  by  subscription 
only,  Augusta,  Ga. ,  1830. "')  To-day  Western  free  traders 
move  as  British  wire-pullers  wisli,  and  try  to  set  the 
West  against  the  East,  the  jilundered  farmer  against  the 
robber  manufacturer,  class  against  class.  Tlie  enlight- 
ened protectionist  commends  the  East  for  its  wise  enter- 
prise, and  says  to  the  West  and  South,  "  Go  and  do  like- 
wise." 

NEW   ENGLAND    INDUSTRIES. 

A.  native  of  New  England,  I  made  my  home  in  the 
West  years  ago,  and  am  satisfied,  yet  not  unmindful  of 
the  advantages  of  my  native  land.  Thus,  I  may  be 
impartial. 

Suppose  we  travel  together  over  ground  familiar  to 
me,  and  keep  our  eyes  open  and  tlioughts  awake,  as  all 
sensible  people  should  when  journeying. 

Start  eastward  from  New  York  over  the  New  Haven 
Railroad.  The  land  is  thin  but  carefully  cultivated,  fine 
towns  and  villages  are  near  each  other,  thrift  and  growth 
are  manifest.  The  life  overflowing  from  the  great  city 
may  help  this,  but  it  lasts  beyond  the  reach  of  that  tide. 

In  tliese  towns  are  mills  and  factories.  In  Bridge- 
port, for  instance,  are  the  great  buildings  where  the 
Wheeler  &  Wilson  sewing  machines  are  made,  and  shops 
of  other  kinds.  Reaching  New  Haven,  the  trade  of 
sea  ajid  land,  the  gathered  wealth  of  two  hundred  years, 
the  colleges  witli  their  army  of  students  may  be  counted, 
but  we  must  add  the  factories  and  shops  to  know  what 
keeps  up  the  life  and  growth.  Turn  north  to  Hartford. 
It  is  the  same  along  tlic  road,  and  on  reaching  tluit  beau- 
tiful city,  we  see  again  great  manufactures  and  wondrous 


Instead  of  Sectional  Jealousy.  167 

meciianism.  Still,  up  the  lovely  valley  of  the  Con- 
necticut, and  we  find  richer  land,  but  narrow  in  extent, 
with  rude  hills  on  either  side,  and  the  blue  mountains 
standing  grandly  against  the  sky,  west  and  north.  Eeach- 
ing  Springfield,  its  mills  and  shops  for  cotton,  wool, 
paper,  hardware,  tools,  and  guns,  give  scope  for  invent- 
ive genius,  varied  employ  to  labor,  activity  to  trade, 
and  ready  market  at  good  prices  for  the  products  of  the 
farms. 

Look  into  the  newspapers,  and  you  see  advertisements 
of  dealers  in  "Western  produce,  with  their  agents  in 
Toledo,  Chicago,  and  other  cities,  showing  how  these 
thousands  of  workmen  reach  out  eager  hands  for  the 
food  wherewith  we  can  fill  them.  Still  north,  at  Holy- 
oke,  the  river  is  spanned  by  a  dam  eleven  hundred  feet 
long;  a  canal  sixty  feet  wide  and  twelve  feet  deep  is 
opened,  and  along  its  banks  are  mills  for  wire,  thread, 
pajjer,  and  cotton,  with  the  stream  tuml^ling  over  the 
rocks  on  the  east,  and  the  homes  of  thirty  thousand 
people  on  the  west. 

At  Nortliampton  we  find  the  old  town,  always  beauti- 
ful, adding  freshness  and  life  to  its  beauty.  Street-cars 
carry  us  to  Florence,  a  suburb  three  miles  westward, 
where  delicate  mechanism  twists  gossamer  threads  and 
finishes  thousands  of  pounds  of  tlie  famed  "Nonotuck" 
sewing  silk  a  month,  paying  400  skilled  men  and  women 
good  wages.  In  a  great  shop,  with  a  lookout  from  its 
upper  windows  over  river  and  meadow  and  mountain, 
worth  going  far  to  see,  are  made  hardware  goods  in  large 
quantities.  Pleasant  homes,  fine  churches,  a  noble 
school  house,  a  library  open  free  to  all,  make  up  the  vil- 
lage of  three  thousand  people — intelligent,  self-respect- 
ing, working  men  and  women. 


168  Coiiuiion  Interest 

We  have  traveled  a  liuudred  and  fifty  miles,  and 
might  go  farther  with  similar  results  and  ohservations. 
On  our  Avay  we  have  jiassed  branch  railroads,  reaching 
into  regions  remote  from  cities,  yet  paying  their  vv^ay  by 
carrying  to  factories  among  the  hills  the  food  that  we 
produce,  and  bringing  back  the  products  of  those  fac- 
tories, to  find  their  way  often  to  us. 

Sliould  we  continue  our  journey,  we  should  find  that 
Worcester,  *'the  heart  of  the  commonwealth,"  with  its 
excellent  population,  and  a  large  share  of  intelligent 
mechanics  among  them,  has  large  and  varied  manufact- 
ures. The  Providence  Railroad  skirts  the  bank  of  tlie 
Blackstone  river,  passing  tln-ough  thirty  miles  of  Avell- 
nigli  continuous  villages,  so  near  neighbors  are  the  mills 
along  tlie  rocky  stream,  and  ends  at  the  great  centre  of 
tlie  industry  and  trade  that  have  made  little  Eliode 
Island  rich,  with  a  soil  so  poor  its  people  would  starve 
unless  fed  from  tlie  Western  prairies.  Its  mills,  too, 
would  close  up  unless  the  South  sent  them  cotton. 

Not  only  great  corporations  carry  on  business,  but,  in 
many  a  smaller  shop  among  New  England  hills,  a  man 
of  moderate  means,  or  a  few  such  combined,  earn  an 
independence,  while  men  of  superior  skill  and  good 
habits  not  only  add  to  the  wealth  of  large  employers, 
but  gain  a  competence  themselves. 

By  returns  of  births  and  deaths  in  Massachusetts, 
mortality  is  decreasing,  and  the  average  of  health  and 
length  of  life  slowly  reaching  upward.  Doubtless,  there 
is  weariness  and  pain  among  factory  workers,  as  well  as 
dullness  and  vice  among  the  lower  grades,  but  tliis  is, 
unfortunately,  the  case  elsewhere,  and  the  results,  on  a 
broad  scale,  tell  well  for  the  influence  of  varied  industry 
on  the  healtli  and  character  of  the  people.     Every  new 


Instead  of  Sectional  Jealousy.  169 

factory  in  tlie  East  benefits  every  farmer  in  the  West  and 
Suuth^  and  our  Avay  is  open  to  increase  that  benefit  by 
increasing  hke  industries  in  our  midst. 

The  East,  with  experience,  skill,  and  capital,  are  mak- 
ing fine  fabrics,  delicate  tools,  and  admirable  mechanism. 
We  begin  with  simpler  products,  and  our  abundant  food 
and  fuel  and  raw  materials  will  draw  manufacturers  to 
lis  with  a  force  sure  as  gravitation,  if  we  are  timely  and 
persistent  in  our  efforts  to  that  end. 

THE    SOUTH — A    NEW    EEA. 

The  South  is  entering  upon  a  new  era. 

Its  singular  advantage  is  in  the  variety  of  its  resources 
— lands  on  the  coasts  and  river-bottoms  of  wonderful 
fertility,  fitted  for  cotton,  rice  and  sugar,  and  plains, 
and  mountain  valleys,  and  hills,  yielding  wheat  and 
corn  and  grass  of  finest  quality  wait  to  be  tilled;  fruits, 
from  the  orange  to  the  peach  and  apple,  can  be  pro- 
duced; swift  streams  are  ready  to  serve  man  by  turning 
many  water-wheels;  large  rivers  can  be  navigated  far  up 
to  the  interior;  great  mines  of  iron  and  copper,  beds  of 
coal  and  quarries  of  stone  wait  to  be  opened;  vast  for- 
ests stand  ready  to  serve  human  needs;  spacious  bays 
and  noble  harbors  are  along  thousands  of  miles  of  coast, 
on  ocean  and  gulf,  and  the  mild,  yet  salubrious  air  of  its 
upper  valleys  favors  vigor  of  body  and  mind.  Such 
variety  of  resources  and  advantages  can  hardly  be  found, 
in  a  similar  extent,  on  the  globe. 

The  lesson  is  plain:  diversify  the  industry  of  the  joeo- 
ple,  that  this  varied  wealth  may  be  developed.  This  is 
the  great  work  of  to-day, — this  is  the  industrial  "recon- 
struction" of  the  South,  by  which  will  come  employ- 
ment, harmony,  comfort,  wealth,  and  the  light  and 
power  of  a  gi'owing  civilization. 


170  Common  Interest 

Under  the  old  system,  land  was  held  in  large  tracts^ 
and  tilled  for  a  few  great  staples,  with  little  variety  in 
its  products;  and  those  staples  were  exported  to  Europe 
and  to  the  North.  Even  the  raising  of  grain  was  neglected, 
and  food  imported  for  the  laborers.  Manufactures  were 
little  thought  of,  and  all  efforts  given  to  the  raising  and 
export  of  these  staples,  robbing  the  soil  of  its  wealth, 
with  no  return  for  the  wholesale  spoilation.  No  wonder 
the  old  planting  States  grew  poor  and  men  migrated  from 
worn-out  lands  to  newer  regions,  to  begin  again,  on  vir- 
gin soil,  the  exhaustive  process  and  thus  gain  a  living- 
for  themselves,  but  hand  down  a  heritage  of  exhaustion 
to  their  children. 

This  system  is  of  the  past.  Lands  will  be  tilled  for 
more  varied  crops,  and  a  gradual  change  will  substitute 
farms  of  moderate  size,  managed  by  their  working  own- 
ers and  occu^jants  for  the  great  plantations.  Grain  will 
be  raised  for  export  as  well  as  home  use,  and  the  risk  of 
failure  of  crops  lessened  by  their  variety.  Cotton  facto- 
ries, iron  mills,  and  machine  shops  must  be  built,  mines 
and  coal-beds  opened,  and  forests  utilized,  giving  employ 
to  all,  attracting  skill  and  capital,  giving  home  markets, 
for  the  farmer's  produce,  saving  vast  costs  of  transporta- 
tion abroad,  and.  paying  back  to  the  soil,  in  fertilizers, 
the  wealth  of  which  it  has  been  robbed. 

Such  will  be  the  new  era,  full  of  benefit  and  blessing. 
Men  of  the  South,  are  you  ready  for  your  noble  work? 
Women  of  the  South,  will  you  give  the  influence  of  your 
womannood,  helping  upward  to  a  better  future? 

A  few  facts  touching  the  home  consumption  of  cotton, 
will  show  the  effect  of  legislation.  In  1824  factories, 
north  of  the  Potomac  used  110,000  l)ales,  but  in  1835 
this  had  grown  to  210,000,  nearly  doubling  in  seven  years. 


Instead  of  Sectional  Jealousy.  171 

from  1828  and  increasing  four  times  as  fast  as  the  popu- 
lation. This  growth  was  under  a  protective  tariff.  In 
1842  the  consumption  was  267,000  bales,  an  increase  of 
but  23  per  cent.,  while  population  had  increased  25  per 
cent.     This  slow  increase  was  under  a  compromise  tariff. 

Of  the  crop  of  1847-8,  the  home  demand  used  531,000 
bales,  nearly  doubling  in  five  years,  and  increasing  six 
times  as  fast  as  population;  this  large  increase  being 
under  a  protective  tariff  again. 

For  three  years,  from  1857  to  1860,  the  average  con- 
sumption was  668,000  bales,  an  increase  of  but  25  per 
cent,  in  ten  years,  while  population  had  grown  forty  per 
cent. ;  this  slow  increase  being  again  under  the  low  tariff 
system  of  1848.  The  South  had  started  home  manufact- 
ures a  little,  and  in  1848  their  cotton  consumption  had 
reached  100,000  bales,  under  a  protective  tariff,  and  the 
Charleston  Mercury  expressed  the  belief  that  in  ten 
years  the  South  Avould  not  export  raw  cotton;  but  that, 
tariff  was  reduced,  and  the  consumption  went  back  to 
87,500  bales  in  1860.  In  1860,  by  the  census,  there 
were  5,235,727  cotton-spindles  in  the  country,  and  the 
increase  up  to  1864-5  was  slight,  if  any,  but  in  1868 
there  were  7,000,000  spindles,  and  the  home  consump- 
tion had  reached  900,000  bales,  in  the  year  ending  Sep- 
tember, 1868.  This  again  Avas  under  a  protective  tariff. 
These  facts  tell  their  own  story. 

In  1868  the  hardy  lumbermen  of  Michigan  fitted  for 
market  750,000,000  feet  of  lumber,  and  the  products  of 
the  mines  and  forests  of  that  State  were  some  140,000,- 
000.  In  1880  they  reached  $75,000,000.  The  total 
product  of  all  Massachusetts  manufactures  in  1880 
was  1631,000,000.  In  ten  years,  from  1855  to  1865, 
the   farm   products    had   grown    from    150,000,000   to 


172  Com7n.o7i  Interest 

$100,000,000,  showing  the  benefit  to  the  farm  of  the 
factory  being  a  neiglibor.  Tliis  was  in  an  old  State, 
and  on  thin  soil;  with  more  room  and  richer  resources 
the  South  can  surely  equal  these  results. 

By  returns  of  the  National  Association  of  Cotton  Manu- 
facturers and  Planters,  there  were  eighty-six  cotton  mills 
in  the  Southern  States  in  1808,  running  215,000  spindles 
and  using  41,500,000  pounds  of  cotton. 

The  increase  of  spindles  from  1868  to  1880  was  nearly 
three  fold,  or  up  to  600,000,  and  the  Boston  Commer- 
cial Bidlotiji  said  in  1874:  "  There  is  nothing  visionary 
in  the  handsome  dividends  that  tlie  mills  of  Georgia  are 
paying,  even  in  these  hard  times." 

Hon.  Alexander  H.  Stephens  wrote  the  Pliiladelphia 
Press : 

"  Suppose  the  cotton  crop  of  my  State  (Georgia)  should  reach 
500,000  bales,  allowing  500  pounds  to  the  bale,  it  would  aggregate 
250,000,000  pounds,  which,  at  ten  cents  per  pound,  would  make 
its  value  |25,000,000.  This  cotton  manufactured  into  thread 
(which  can  be  done  more  cheaply  in  Georgia  than  in  Massachu- 
setts and  Rhode  Island)  and  exported  in  this  shape  to  the  North 
and  to  Europe  to  be  put  into  cloth,  would  amount  in  value  to 
$75,000,000,  instead  of  $25,000,000  when  only  the  raw  material  is 
exported.  Our  future,  therefore,  is  great  and  hopeful  in  prospect 
if  our  people  are  but  true  to  themselves  in  working  out  their  own 
high  destiny." 

Tlie  great  Industrial  Exhibition  in  Atlanta  in  1880, 
gave  cheering  proofs  of  the  growth  of  Southern  skill  and 
varied  industry.  In  1874  Louisville,  Ky.,  had  500  manu- 
facturing establishments,  with  120,000,000  invested, 
$56,000,000  produced,  and  ten  thousand  workers  em- 
ployed. Tennessee  iron  is  sold  in  all  Western  markets; 
Alabama  iron  is  made  into  car  Avliecls  in  Philadelphia, 
and  its  ore  goes  to  Indiana  furnaces.     The  Vulcan  and 


Instead  of  Sectional  Jealousy.  173 

Tredegar  works  of  Eichmond,  Va.,  ship  their  products 
to  Cuba  and  Soutli  America,  and  make  fish-bar  bolts  for 
Xortliern  railways. 

The  iron  product  of  Alabama  increased  792  per  cent., 
and  that  of  Georgia  245  per  cent.,  from  1870  to  1880. 
Thus  ''the  good  work  goes  bravely  on,"  under  the 
benign  influence  of  a  national  protective  policy.  With 
that  policy,  and  loith  persistent  effort  on  their  -part,  the 
new  era  of  diversified  industry  in  the  South  is  sure  to 
come,  full  of  blessing  and  benefit ;  but  luith  free  trade, 
or  its  near  hin  "  tariff  for  revenue  only,''  their  efforts 
will  be  vain,  and  new  troubles  aivait  them  and  all  of  us. 

Ex-Governor  Bullock,  of  Atlanta,  Georgia,  now 
engaged  in  cotton  manufacture,  attended  the  Tariff 
Conventions  in  Chicago  and  New  York  last  Noveml^er. 
At  Cliicago  he  said  : 

"Visionary  theories  are  disappearing  before  the  substantial 
advance  of  accomplished  facts.  Here  the  East,  the  West  and  the 
Soiitli  meet  together  witli  a  common  purpose  and  a  common  inter- 
est to  foster  and  encourage  such  legislation  as  will  by  its  protective 
features  build  up  the  mechanical  industries  whereby  we  can  fab- 
ricate within  the  borders  of  our  own  country  the  natural  products 
of  our  soil,  our  mines  and  of  our  forests,  thereby  securing  an 
enhanced  and  diversified  prosperity,  by  making  sections  and  com- 
munities more  homogeneous  and  less  dependent  upon  artificial 
means  of  transportation. 

"It  is  a  trite  saying,  but  none  the  less  true,  that  the  farmer 
needs  the  mechanic  to  consume  his  surplus  of  provisions,  and  the 
mechanic  needs  the  farmer  to  use  his  surplus  of  fabiics. 

"I  have  said  this  gathering  marks  an  era.  It  is  within  the 
memory  of  the  youngest  man  here  that  corn  has  been  burned  as 
fuel  in  this  section,  when  underlying  the  fields  upon  which  that 
corn  was  grown  were  veins  of  the  finest  coal. 

"I  regret  to  say  that  in  my  section  we  are  to-day  wearing  out 
the  points  of  plows  not  made  at  home,  by  dragging  them  through 
the  iron  ore  that  lays  upon  our  hill-sides." 


174  Common  Interest 

In  a  late  speech  in  tlic  Capitol  at  Washington,  Hon. 
(t.  W.  Hewitt,  M.  C,  of  Alabama,  said  : 

"No  great  measure  has  promoted  the  general  prosperity  of  the 
country  to  a  greater  extent  than  the  protection  of  American  labor 
and  American  industries.  *  *  *  New  England  farmers  have 
prospered  because  they  have  factories  near,  and  a  market  at  their 
door  for  all  they  have  to  sell.  The  Alabama  farmers  are  as  much 
interested  in  the  development  of  coal  and  iron,  and  the  building 
of  cotton  mills,  as  any  class  of  persons." 

Mr.  Hewitt  spoke  of  the  coal  and  iron  of  his  State, 
** equal  to  a  supply  of  the  world  for  many  centuries." 

A    WESTERN   VIEW. 

Tlie  Indianapolis  Journal  says  : 

"  Nothing  in  the  moral  world  is  more  certain  than  that  the  pros- 
perity and  welfare  of  the  country  demand  a  policy  of  judicious 
protection.  It  is  the  habit  of  some  to  dismiss  the  consideration  of 
this  subject  with  the  remark  that  it  concerns  only  the  manufact- 
uring interest,  and  consequently  is  interesting  only  to  a  class. 
There  could  be  no  greater  mistake  than  this.  It  concerns  all 
interests,  the  development  of  the  whole  coimtry,  and  the  pros- 
perity of  every  individual.  If  protection  is  the  true  policy,  as 
reason,  experience,  and  facts  prove  it  to  be,  the  farmers  of  Indi- 
ana and  the  West  are  as  much  interested  in  its  establishment  as 
are  the  manufacturers  of  New  England  and  the  East.  For  it 
stands  to  reason  that  the  development  of  manufactures  means  the 
creation  of  a  home  market  for  the  products  of  the  soil,  with  diver- 
sified industry  and  general  prosperity. 

"Suppose  the  case  of  a  farmer  without  any  market  at  all  for 
his  surplus  products.  Suppose  him  to  be  located  in  the  midst  of 
an  extensive  plain  or  valley,  fertile  and  productive,  but  inaccessi- 
ble and  so  completely  cut  off  from  the  rest  of  the  world  that  he 
would  have  no  market  at  all.  Not  only  would  the  results  of  his 
toil  be  greatly  lessened  by  the  impossibility  of  prociu'ing  labor- 
saving  machinery  and  implements,  but  all  tliat  he  i)i'()duced  over 
and  above  the  wants  of  himself  and  familj'  would  be  sheer 
waste, — dead  loss  for  the  lack  of  a  market.     The  condition  of 


Instead  of  Sectional  Jealousy.  175 

.such  Pi  farmer  would  be  most  deplorable.  Second,  suppose  that 
instead  of  no  market  at  all  he  had  a  very  distant  one,  say  a  manu- 
facturing city  or  town  a  hundred  miles  distant,  and  accessible  only 
by  country  road.  This  would  be  an  imj^rovement,  but  still  very 
far  from  a  happy  condition.  The  remoteness  of  the  market  and 
the  difficulty  of  reaching  it  would  prevent  him  from  availing  him- 
self of  it  with  any  regularity.  If  other  farmers  were  situated 
near  it,  he  would  be  completely  at  their  mercy.  He  could  sell  but 
very  few  articles,  and  would  have  to  take  the  buyer's  price.  But, 
third,  suppose  a  manufacturing  town  to  spring  up  within  a  few 
miles  of  the  farmer's  house,  and  the  means  of  communication 
such  as  to  enable  him  to  market  his  products  every  day  or  when- 
ever it  suited  Iiim.  Now,  he  not  only  has  a  steady  and  reliable 
sale  for  all  he  can  produce,  at  good  prices,  but  he  is  encouraged 
to  engage  in  branches  of  agriculture  untried  before,  and  to  pro- 
duce articles  which  he  had  never  dreamed  there  was  any  demand 
for  or  any  profit  in.  By  the  cheapening  of  many  things  which 
he  needed,  and  which  are  now  produced  almost  at  his  door,  his 
labor  is  rendered  more  easy  and  productive,  while  the  surplus  pro- 
duce which  before  was  accustomed  to  decay  on  his  hands  now 
finds  steady  and  profitable  sale.  To  state  the  case  in  a  nutshell, 
protection  creates  a  home  market  for  home  products. " 

The  aggi-egate  value  of  tlie  manufactures,  leading 
mechanic  arts  and  flouring  mills  included,  of  seven  lead- 
ing cities  in  the  Xorthwest  in  1880  was  1587,000,000. 
(This  includes  Chicago,  Milwaukee,  St.  Louis,  Louis- 
ville, Detroit,  Cincinnati  and  Cleveland;  see  U.  S. 
census.)  The  great  coal  fields  of  Iowa  must  be  utilized 
there.  California  and  Oregon  are  beginning  to  manufact- 
ure woolens  and  iron,  and  with  the  growth  of  manufact- 
ures protective  opinion  gains.  Xew  York  Cit}-  is 
becoming  a  great  centre  of  home  industry  as  well  as  of 
foreign  trade.  The  quarter  of  a  million  workmen  this 
einploys  cannot  be  the  dumb  slaves  of  a  policy  that  ends 
in  low  wages.  The  men  who  have  invested  over  1150,- 
000,000  in  these  establishments  cannot  sit  quiet  and  see 


176 


Common  Interest 


efforts  for  legislation  which  would  discriminate  against 
them  and  in  favor  of  foreigners.  So  we  find  in  New 
York,  a  great  tariff  convention  and  a  strong  industrial 
league. 

The  Chicago  Inter  Ocean,  in  commenting  on  the  sta- 
tistics of  the  census  of  1880  relative  to  the  manufactures 
of  leading  cities,  says: 

"  It  is  important  as  showing  the  vast  extent  to  which  New  York 
City  is  indebted  for  its  commercial  prestige  to  tlie  fact  tliat  it  is 
the  centre  of  American  manufactures.  The  total  manufactures 
of  the  port  of  New  York  proper,  including  merely  those  of  New 
York  City,  Jersey  City,  and  Brooklyn,  and  excluding  those  of 
Paterson.  Newark,  Elizabeth,  Yonkers,  and  other  manufacturing 
suburbs  of  New  York,  are  as  follows: 


Cities. 

Establish- 
ments. 

Capital. 

Workers. 

Annual 
product. 

11,163 

5,089 

555 

$164,917,856 
50,631,399 
11,329,915 

217,977 
45,336 
10,688 

$488,209,348 

169,757,590 

59,581,541 

Total 

16,806 

$232,869,170 

373,891 

$717,548,379 

"The  total  imports  and  exports  of  merchandise  at  the  "ort  of 
York  for  1880  were  as  follows: 

Imports  of  merchandise $459,937,153 

Exports  of  merchandise 385,506,602 

Total $845,443,755 

"It  appears,  therefore,  that  the  annual  product  of  the  manufact- 
ures of  New  York  City  alone  exceeds  by  $30,000,000  its  entire 
imports,  though  these  imports  are  for  distribution  over  the  entire 
country,  and  the  aggregate  annual  product  of  the  port  of  New 
York  very  nearly  equals  its  entire  imports  and  exports  combined. 
Indeed,  if  the  two  manufacturing  suburbs — Newark  and  Pater- 
son— are  included,  the  total  annual  product  considerably  exceeds 


Instead  of  Sectional  Jealousy.  177 

the  entire  imports  and  exports  of  that  great  mart  which  has  been 
supposed  by  some  to  live  out  of  its  foreign  trade.  The  fact  is  that 
New  York,  like  the  rest  of  the  country,  is  acquiring  a  volume 
of  business  in  connection  with  its  manufactures  and  domestic 
trade  which,  in  relative  importance,  rises  far  above  its  foreign 
trade.  The  entire  foreign  trade  of  New  York,  import  and  export, 
probably  does  not  support  more  than  100,000  out  of  its  1,250,000 
people." 

Pliiladclpnia,  with  her  longer  established  and  more 
varied  industries,  aggregating  1430,000,000,  prizes  the 
thrift  and  wealth  they  bring  her  people.  It  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  manufactures  give  employ  to  many 
more  persons  than  mercantile  business  of  a  like  amount 
does,  or  can. 

A  careful  article  in  a  late  International  Review  shows 
that  in  1850,  in  nine  Western  States— Ohio,  Indiana, 
Illinois,  Michigan,  Wisconsin,  Iowa,  Missouri,  Kansas, 
and  Nebraska— there  were  24,931  manufacturing  estab- 
lishments employing  110,501  persons,  and  producing 
$146,348,554  worth.  In  1880  these  had  grown  to  124,- 
763,  employing  755,286  persons,  and  ^jroducing  11,819,- 
588,355  worth.  In  1850  the  Western  States  and  terri- 
tories had  about  12  per  cent,  of  the  total  investment 
of  the  United  States  in  manufactures  ;  in  1880,  over  30 
per  cent.,  with  3,500,000  of  their  20,000,000  people  sus- 
tained by  manufactures  and  mechanism,  and  purchasers 
of  farm  products. 

An  early  settler,  now  owner  in  a  large  .ron  mill  in  a 
Western  city,  tells  of  an  old  and  valued  friend,  a  pioneer 
farmer,  who  was  an  earnest  and  honest  free  trader, 
opposed  to  ''monopolists."  He  came  one  day  for  a 
visit,  and  they  went  through  the  mill  together,  talked  of 
its  product  wages  market  for  produce  and  the  like,  but 
no  word  of  protection  or  free  trade.     Going   back  to 


178  Coimnon  Interest 

the  office  the  visitor  sat  silent  and  in  absent  thought, 
until  he  was  asked  what  troubled  him.  He  rose  up  and 
said:  "I've  been  a  fool  on  this  tariff  question  all  my 
days,  and  looking  over  your  mill  has  let  light  into  my 
old  head.  I'll  go  with  you  for  any  fair  thing  to  build 
more  such  mills  among  our  farms." 

A  protective  policy  binds  together  all  parts  of .  our 
country  as  with  hooks  of  steel,  and  helps  to  good  work 
and  good  will  for  all. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

OUR   HISTORY    TEACHES    THE    BENEFITS    OF    PRO- 
TECTION. 

Our  national  history  teaches  the  benefits  of  protection 
and  tlie  perils  of  free  trade.     Within  three  months  after 
his   inauguration   as   our    first   President,   Washington 
readily  signed  the  first  tariil  act,  "  for  the  encourage- 
ment and  protection  of  manufactures."    Jefferson  and 
other  leading  men  held  like  opinions,  and  Fisher  Ames, 
of  Massachusetts,  said  in  Congress,  in  the  debates  on 
the  first  tariff  bill  :   "The  present  Constitution  was  dic- 
tated by  commercial  necessity  more  than  any  other  cause. 
The  want  of  an  efficient  government  to  secure  our  man- 
ufacturing interest  and  advance  our  commerce  was  long 
seen  by  men  of  judgment  and  patriots."     No  marvel  in 
this,  since  Great  Britain  constantly  crushed  our  com- 
merce and  manufactures  by  oppressive  laws,  so  long  as 
we  were  her  subject  colonies.      Yet  to-day  men  in  Con- 
gress and  elsewhere  profess  to  doubt  what  no  man  of 
any  party  doubted  then, — the   Constitutional  right  to 
enact  protective  tariff  laws,  a  right  maintained  by  the 
words  and  acts  of  Hamilton,  Madison  and  other  framers 
of  our   Constitution.      Modern  free  traders   claim   to 
know    what    that   instrument    means   better  than   its 
framers.      Theorists  like  Professor  Perry  arraign   the 
wisdom    of   these   great    men,    and    assert    that   they 
established  an  *' utterly  false  principle"  in  "national 
legislation,"    which    has    grown    "more    unjust    and 

179 


180  Our  History  Teaches  the 

abominable."  The  protective  idea  was  prominent,  too, 
in  the  minds  of  the  people.  Horace  Greeley  says  (in 
Political  Economy)  : 

"When  the  Federal  Constitution  was  adopted  in  1787,  and  it 
was  announced  that  enough  States  had  voted  to  ratify  it,  tiiere 
were  instantly  great  rejoicings  in  all  the  seaboard  villages,  and 
great  processions  were  formed,  wherein  the  laboring  classes 
appeared  pai'ading  the  hammer  and  the  anvil,  crying  out,  '  Pro- 
tection to  American  industry  !'  They  had  had  free  trade  since 
the  war  ended,  and  they  had  had  enough  of  markets  glutted  with. 
foreign  goods  and  no  demand  for  American  labor." 

He  states,  also,  that  when  a  protective  tariff  act  was 
passed  in  1828,  the  British  vessels  in  Charleston  harbor 
put  their  flags  at  half  mast  as  mourning  over  a  calamity. 

But  the  early  protective  measures  were  inadequate^ 
although  beneficial  to  some  extent. 

At  the  close  of  the  war  of  1812  the  country  was  over- 
whelmed by  the  enormous  imiDortation  of  cottons  and 
woolens,  admitted  at  a  duty  of  five  per  cent,  ad  valorem. 
Although  Great  Britain  lost  heavily  by  the  first  importa- 
tions, she  consoled  herself  for  this  loss  by  the  prospect 
of  permanently  commanding  our  markets.  It  was  at 
this  very  period,  namely,  on  the  9th  of  April,  1816,  that 
Mr.  Brougham  remarked  in  the  House  of  Commons  : 

"It  was  well  worth  while  to  incur  a  loss  upon  the  first  exporta- 
tion, in  order,  by  the  glut,  to  stifle  in  the  cradle  those  infant 
manufactui'es  in  the  United  States,  which  the  war  had  forced  into 
existence,  contrary  to  the  natural  order  of  things. " 

Mr.  Greeley  gives  his  personal  recollections  as  follows: 
"My  distinct  personal  recollections  on  llus  head  go  back  to 
the  period  of  industrial  derangement,  business  collapse,  and  wide- 
spread pecuniary  ruin,  which  closely  followed  the  close,  in  1815, 
of  our  last  war  with  Great  Britain.  Peace  found  this  country 
dotted  with  furnaces  and  factories,  which  had  suddenly  sprung 
up  under  the  precarious  shelter  of  embargo  and  war.     These — not 


Benefits  of  Protection.  181 

yet  firmly  established,  in  a  country  whose  commerce,  before  canals, 
railroads  or  steam  were  known,  was  almost  wholly  external  or  on 
the  seaboard — found  themselves  suddenly  exposed  to  a  determined 
and  relentless  foreign  competition.  Great  Britain  had  pushed  her 
fabrics  into  almost  every  corner  of  the  world.  Of  some  of  these  great 
stocks  had  nevertheless  accumulated,  out  of  fashion,  and  only  salable 
far  below  cost.  These  were  thrown  on  our  markets  in  a  perfect 
deluge,  being  advertised  in  Boston  journals  at  'pound  for  pound,' 
— that  is,  what  cost  f4.44  (really  $4.80)  to  make  in  England  being 
sold  in  Boston,  duty  and  charges  paid,  for  $3.33.  The  tariff  of  1816, 
mainly  framed  by  William  Lowndes,  was  meant  as  a  barrier 
against  this  inundation,  but  proved  inadequate,  except  on  coarse 
cottons  and  a  few  other  rude  products.  Our  manufactories  went 
down  like  grain  before  the  mower ;  our  agriculture  and  the  wages 
of  labor  speedily  followed.  In  I^ew  England  I  judge  that  fully 
one-fourth  of  the  property  went  through  the  sheriff's  mill;  and  the 
prostration  was  scarcely  less  general  elsewhere.  In  Kentucky  the 
presence  of  debt  was  universal  and  intolerable.  In  New  York 
the  principal  merchants  united  (1817)  in  a  memorial  to  Congress  to 
save  our  commerce  as  well  as  our  manufactures  from  utter  ruin 
by  increasing  the  tariff  and  prohibiting  the  sale  at  auction  of 
imported  fabrics." 

The  tariff  act  of  1816  extended  and  increased  specific 
duties,  and  was  passed  by  a  vote  of  88  to  54  in  the  House 
and  a  majority  in  tlie  Senate.  Twenty-five  votes  in  its 
favor  were  cast  by  Southern  members,  such  eminent  men 
as  Lumpkins  and  Cuthbert  of  Georgia,  E.  M.  Johnson 
of  Kentucky,  Barbour  and  St.  George  Tucker  of  Vir- 
ginia, and  Lowndes  and  John  C.  Calhoun  of  South  Caro- 
lina, among  them,  — the  last  named  strongly  advocating 
the  measure  as  necessary  for  prosperitv  and  national 
unity. 

But  tnese  able  men,  aiming  to  build  up  our  manufact- 
ures and  thus  benefit  our  farms,  had  not  learned  the 
persistent  resolve  and  power  of  our  British  competitors, 
and  the  tariff  they  framed,  althougli  protective  in  its 


182  Our  History  Teaches  the 

aim  and  method,  did  not  prove  to  be  a  barrier  strong 
enough,  and  a  few  years  showed  that  it  must  be  strength- 
ened, as  it  was  by  the  tariff  of  1834. 

The  Chicago  Commercial  Advertiser  sums  up  hiter 
tariff  history  as  folloAvs: 

"Our  first  tariff  worthy  of  the  name  of  protection  was  that  of 
1824.  For  a  number  of  years  previous  to  that  date  the  condition 
of  the  whole  country  was  deplorable.  The  American  markets; 
were  flooded  with  foreign  merchandise.  Home  manufacturers 
were  everywhere  overmastered  by  ruinous  competition  from  abroad. 
Employment  was  scarce  and  wages  ridiculously  low.  An  em- 
barrassed condition  was  the  common  lot.  So  soon  as  the  tariff  of 
1824  went  into  operation  the  whole  aspect  and  course  of  affairs 
were  changed.  Activity  took  the  place  of  sluggishness.  Capital 
sought  investments.  Labor  came  into  demand.  Wages  advanced. 
Mines  were  opened,  furnaces  built,  mills  started,  shops  multiplied. 
Business  revived  in  all  its  departments.  Revenue  flowed  copiously 
into  the  coffers  of  the  government.  The  debts  created  by  two  expen- 
sive wars  were  entirely  paid  off.  Such  a  scene  of  general  prosperity 
had  never  before  been  seen  "by  our  people.  More  stringent  pro- 
tection was  provided  by  the  act  of  1828,  and  affairs  still  more  rap- 
idly improved.  President  Jackson  said,  in  his  annual  message, 
December  4,  1832:  '  Our  country  presents  on  every  side  marks  of 
prosperity  and  happiness,  unequaled,  perhaps,  in  any  other  por- 
tion of  the  world.' 

"Then  came  the  nullification  times  of  South  Carolina  and  the 
compromise  tariff  of  1833.  This  act  took  effect  January  1,  1834, 
and  was  to  operate  by  a  series  of  periodical  reductions  of  the  rates 
on  imports  until  June  30,  1842,  after  which  date  no  duty  was  to 
exceed  twenty  per  cent.  Under  this  legislation  industry  and  trade 
soon  declined.  Foreign  goods  poured  like  an  inundation  into  our 
markets.  Less  than  three  and  a  half  years  brought  the  panic  and 
the  collapse  of  1837.  Affairs  went  from  bad  to  worse.  The  gov- 
ernment became  impoverished  with  the  people.  Its  resources  sank 
so  low  that  President  Tyler  could  not  at  one  time  obtain  the  pay- 
ment of  his  salary,  and  had  to  resort  to  the  brokers  for  loans. 

"Alleviation  was  sought  and  obtained  by  the  protective  tariff  of 
1842,  the  best  measure  of  the  kind  we  have  had  in  all  oiu-  history. 


Benefits  of  Proiection. 


183 


A  most  extraordinary  revival  of  production  and  trade  was  speedily 
accomplished.  We  may  sum  up  the  results  in  the  words  of  Presi- 
dent Polk's  annual  message,  December  8, 1846,  as  follows :  '  Labor 
in  all  its  branches  is  receiving  an  ample  reward,  while  education, 
science,  and  the  arts  are  rapidly  enlarging  the  means  of  social  hap- 
piness. The  progress  of  our  country  in  her  career  of  greatness, 
not  only  in  the  vast  extension  of  our  territorial  limits,  and  in  the 
rapid  increase  of  our  population,  but  in  resources  and  wealth,  and 
in  the  happy  condition  of  our  people,  is  without  an  example  in  the 
history  of  nations.' 

"When  these  glowing  words  were  published  the  free  trade  tariff 
of  1846  had  been  in  operation  just  eight  days.  Although  the 
movement  was  slower  than  from  1833,  the  decadence  went  on 
steadily.  Our  Presidents  ceased  to  congratulate  the  country  on  its 
prosperity.  Yet  a  further  reduction  of  the  tariff  took  place  in 
1857,  followed,  in  a  few  months,  by  the  panic  of  that  year.  Reve- 
nue declined.  Wages  went  down.  Employment  at  any  pay  was 
hard  to  find.  Just  before  the  rebellion  the  government  was  bor- 
rowing money  to  pay  its  ordinary  expenses  in  time  of  peace. 

"  In  1861  was  passed  that  protective  taiiff  which  the  free  traders 
denounced  as  '  the  bill  of  abominations. '  Under  that  and  the  fol- 
lowing acts  we  once  more  had  a  marvelous  recuperation  of  pro- 
duction and  commerce." 

With  comprehensive  terseness  Henry  C.  Carey  con- 
denses the  matter  in  this  way 


"Protection,  as  established  in 
1813,  1828,  1843,  gave,  as  that 
of  1861  is  giving:  Great  de- 
mand for  labor.  Wages  high 
and  money  cheap.  Public  and 
private  revenues  large,  and  im- 
migration great  and  steadily  in- 
creasing. Public  and  private 
property  great  beyond  all  pre- 
vious precedent.  Growing  na- 
tional independence. " 


' '  British  free  trade  as  estab- 
lished in  1817,  1834,  1846  and 
1857,  bequeathed  to  its  succes- 
sor: Labor  everywhere  seek- 
ing to  be  employed.  Wages 
low  and  money  high.  Public 
and  private  revenues  small  and 
steadily  decreasing.  Lnmigra- 
tiou  declining.  Public  and  pri- 
vate bankruptcy  nearly  uni- 
versal. Growing  national  de- 
pendence." 


184  Our  History  Teaches  the 

PEOTECTIVE   TAKIFFS    BEST   FOR    REVENUE. 

The  Chicago  Morning  Herald  refutes  a  loose  assertion 
of  the  Chicago  Tribune  that  "  tariffs  are  a  mechanism  for 
promoting  jjrotection  by  choking  off  revenue,'.'  by  a  tabu- 
lar statement  of  receipts  in  fifteen  years  of  revenue  tar- 
iffs, from  1847  to  1861,  as  $708,082,956,— and  for  fif- 
teen years  with  a  protective  tariff,  from  1867  to  1881,  as 
$3,577,601,931, — the  revenue  for  government  in  the  last, 
or  protective,  period,  three  and  a  half  times  greater  than 
ill  the  tariff  for  revenue  period  ! 

Not  forgetful  of  the  effects  of  good  or  bad  crops,  of 
wars,  and  of  the  new  abundance  of  gold  and  silver  in 
the  world,  we  can  see  that  our  protective  policy  has  been 
a  power  for  good  through  all.  It  should  be  borne  espe- 
cially in  mind  that  the  panic  and  financial  peril  of  the 
last  few  years,  beginning  in  the  United  States  in  1873, 
was  world-wide ;  was  the  only  panic  ever  felt  in  this 
country  under  a  protective  jDolicy ;  and  that  we  felt  it 
less,  had  less  distress  of  workmen  and  disaster  to  capital 
than  free-trade  England,  and  recovered  from  it  sooner 
than  England  did.  France,  a  protective  country,  and 
the  United  States  with  a  like  policy,  had  less  trouble 
and  earlier  recovery  than  any  other  great  nations.  The 
horizontal  reduction  of  ten  per  cent,  in  our  tariff  in 
1872,  doubtless  helped  to  increase  the  panic  of  1873. 

The  credit  of  our  government,  and  the  interest  it 
pays  on  its  notes  and  bonds,  tells  the  same  story.  In 
1860,  at  the  close  of  a  dozen  years  of  revenue  tariff, 
treasury  notes  payable  in  one  year  were  issued  as  a 
necessity  to  pay  expenses.  Of  these  $10,000,000  worth 
were  sold  with  some  difficulty,  half  of  them  at  12  per 
cent.,  over  three-fourths  at  10  to  12  per  cent.,  one-tenth 


Benefits  of  Protection.  185 

■only  at  6  to  8  per  cent., — high  rates  for  those  days.  No'W 
our  government  pays  low  rates,  3  or  4  per  cent,  as  a  sure, 
investment  for  hundreds  of  millions  of  capital. 

•COOPER   INSTITUTE   SPEECH,   IN   NEW   YORK,  OF   DEXTER 
A.    HAWKINS. 

A  great  meeting  was  held  February  1st,  1883,  in  the 
Cooper  Institute,  at  which  Peter  Cooper  presided,  and 
Hon.  W.  M.  Evarts  and  other  eminent  men  spoke. 
Extracts  from  the  address  of  Mr.  Hawkins  will  help  our 
knowledge  of  the  industrial  history  we  are  now  making  : 

"We  have  had  four  protective  tariffs  in  this  century.  Under 
the  three  former  the  country  was  uniformly  prosperous.  Imme- 
diately following  their  respective  repeals,  the  country  passed 
through  periods  of  great  depression,  insolvency,  and  bankruptcy. 
But,  as  the  nation  was  then  small  and  poor,  the  free  traders  may 
say  that  what  was  for  our  interest  then  is  not  for  our  interest 
now, — that  we  are  so  large  and  prosperous  that  a  different  system 
is  required. 

"Let  us  consider,  then,  the  effect  upon  the  prosperity  of  the 
countiy  of  the  tariff  of  1861,  which  is  now  in  force.  This  pros- 
perity, like  a  river,  is  made  up  of  many  streamlets. 

"The  mining  and  consumption  of  coal  means  force,  power, 
energy  for  manufactures,  transportation,  and  the  creation  of 
wealth.  England  now  mines  one  hundred  and  sixty  million  tons 
of  coal  a  year.  This  applied  to  her  machinery  gives  her  the  pro- 
ducing and  wealth-creating  capacity  of  six  liundred  millions  of 
men,  though  her  population  is  less  than  forty  milhons. 

"In  1861  our  output  of  coal  was  only  sixteen  million  tons.  In 
1883,  after  twenty-one  years  of  protective  tariff,  it  had  risen  to 
ninety  million  tons,  being  a  gain  of  four  hundred  and  sixty-two 
and  a  half  per  cent.  That  means  that  the  effective  capacity  of 
the  machinery  of  this  country  and  its  power  to  create  wealth  are 
five  and  five-eighths  times  what  they  were  twenty-one  years  ago. 

"Twenty  j'ears  more  of  like  progress  and  our  output  of  coal 


186  Our  History  Teaches  the 

will  exceed  that  of  England  or  any  other  country  on  the  globe, 
and  will  give  us  a  capacity  in  producive  machinery  of  at  least  six 
hundred  millions  of  human  beings. 

"A  high  protective  tariff  is  a  sort  of  Titanic  steam-pressure 
put  upon  this  enormous  dormant  force  of  wealth  and  influence  to 
make  it  active  and  productive. 

"In  1861  we  had  only  thirty-one  thousand  miles  of  railway, 
and  nearly  all  of  this  was  single  track.  Now  we  have  one  hun- 
dred and  fourteen  thousand  miles,  one-quarter  of  which  is  double 
track,  being  a  gain  in  mileage,  under  the  stimulus  of  twenty-one 
years  of  protective  tariff,  of  eighty-three  thousand  miles,  or  two 
hundred  and  thirty-seven  per  cent.  The  value  of  this  eighty- 
three  thousand  miles,  at  the  average  capitalization  of  fifty  thou- 
sand dollars  per  mile,  is  four  thousand  one  hundred  and  fifty 
millions  ($4,150,000,000).  This  is  just  so  much,  in  this  item 
alone,  added  to  our  national  wealth  in  this  short  period. 

"  The  gross  earnings  of  this  hundred  and  fourteen  thousand 
miles  of  railway,  last  year,  were  eight  hundred  million  dollars 
($800,000,000),  or  an  average  of  seven  thousand  dollars  per  mile  ; 
and  yet  transportation  of  freight  and  passengers  has  been  cheap- 
ened, until  now  it  is  only  one-quarter  of  what  it  was  thirty  years 
ago. 

' '  The  gross  earnings  last  year  of  our  railways  were  sufficient  to 
buy  the  entire  mercantile  marine  of  Great  Britain. 

"  A  tariff,  protecting  our  own  industry  against  injurious  foreign 
competition,  compels  foreign  countries  to  send  us,  instead  of  mer- 
chandise, their  operatives,  to  save  them  from  starvation,  and  their 
capitalists  in  order  to  find  profitable  employment  for  their  money. 
If  we  let  their  merchandise  come  in  without  protective  taxation, 
these  operatives  and  capitalists  would  eke  out  a  subsistence  at 
home,  and  their  countries  would  send  us  merchandise  instead  of 
men  and  women. 

"European  statisticians  inform  \is  that  the  average  cost  to  them 
of  raising  the  emigrants  that  come  to  this  country  is  one  thousand, 
dollars  per  head.  •  They  are  worth  to  us  much  mora  than  that 
sum."  *  *  *  *  *  *  * 

"Arc  we  now  preiKucd  to  try  the  disastrous  experiment  of  free 
trade  for  the  fifth  time? 


Benefits  of  Protection.  187" 

"We  have  been  doing  very  well,  under  a  protective  tariff, 
Hadn't  we  better  let  well  enough  alone? 

"Modifications  in  detail  are  required,  but  the  principle  of  pro- 
tection to  our  own  industries  is  sound  and  should  not  be  touched, 
for  it  leads  only  to  individual  and  national  prosperity." 

The  New  York  Shipping  List  says  that  forty-two  years, 
ago  the  wealtli  of  Great  Britain  was  computed  to  be  five 
fold  greater  than  ours,  but  now  Mr.  Mulhall,  an  eminent. 
English  statistician,  concedes  that  the  United  States. 
exceeds  Great  Britain  in  total  wealth,  though  not  quite 
equal  to  it  per  capita. 

Estimates  made  by  Charles  S.  Hill,  Statistician  of  the. 
Department  of  State,  representing  the  Metropolitan 
Industrial  League,  of  New  York,  which  appear  in  evi- 
dence taken  by  the  tariff  commission,  are  as  follows: 

Pojndathn.— United  States,  50,150,000;  Great  Britain,  34,505,- 
000;  France,  37,166,000;  Germany,  45,367,000;  Russia,  82,400,000; 
Austria,  39,175,000. 

Wealth.— United  States,  $55,000,000,000;  Great  Britain,  $45,000,- 
000,000;  France,  $40,000,000,000;  Germany,  $25,000,000,000;  Rus- 
sia, $15,000,000,000;  Austria,  $14,000,000,000. 

This  chapter  of  lessons  from  our  history  has  a  solid 
value,  not  to  be  found  in  any  plausible  free  trade  theories. 
Those  theories  are  like  apples  of  Sodom — fair  to  the  eye? 
but  nauseous  to  the  taste. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

FOREIGN  COMMERCE— AMERICAN  SHIPS. 

*'0f  what  consequence  is  it  to  me  whose  ships  sail  from 
■our  ports?  Britisli  or  American,  it  affects  me  little  if 
^ny."  Something  like  this  the  farmer  on  a  Western 
prairie,  or  the  cotton  grower  far  up  some  Southern  river, 
might  say.  Yet  it  is  very  important  to  them.  Let  war 
break  out  in  Europe,  and  Great  Britain  be  involved, 
while  British  ships  carry  our  wheat  and  cotton  and  pro- 
visions, and  a  blockade  rolls  back  a  tide  of  disaster  to 
every  farmer's  door,  no  matter  how  far  inland  he  may  be. 
Let  American  ships  be  our  carriers,  and  our  flag,  at 
peace  with  all  Europe,  conveys  those  farm  products  safe 
to  every  land.  American  ships  must  carry  our  exports 
to  foreign  countries,  and  none  are  more  interested  in 
this  than  our  farmers.  The  manufacturer  has  like  inter- 
•est,  for  the  same  reason,  and  also  because  foreign  ship- 
•owners  cannot  be  exijected  to  help  him  in  getting  good 
markets  as  Americans  would.  On  the  seas,  as  on  land, 
we  want  an  American  policy — the  control  of  our  trade 
and  transportation — and  for  this  we  must  build  up  a 
^reat  American  commercial  marine. 

At  an  early  day,  when  only  a  narrow  line  along  our 
Atlantic  coast  was  settled,  and  the  development  of  the 
gi'eat  West  was  hardly  thought  of,  the  ocean  opened  a 
wide  field  for  enterprise,  the  troubled  condition  of 
European  affairs  favored  our  ships,  and  a  large  ocean 
carrying  trade  fell  into  our  hands.  Tiien  came  the 
rapid  settlement  of  the  West,  the  period  of  internal 

188 


Americcm  Ships.  18^ 

development,  with  capital  and  enterprise  turning  west- 
ward instead  of  oceanward,  railroads  bnilt  at  a  cost 
greater  than  that  of  the  whole  British  navy,  farms, 
factories,  towns  and  cities  springing  up  in  the  wilder- 
ness and  on  the  prairies,  thousands  of  steamers  and  sail 
vessels  built  to  carry  on  our  vast  inland  commerce, 
greater  than  all  our  foreign  trade.  In  the  late  civil 
war  British  Alabamas  in  Confederate  service  swept  our 
seas  and  crippled  our  merchant  ships.  The  new  era  of 
iron  ship  building  began  in  England,  and  Great  Britain 
spent  millions  yearly  in  paying  for  ocean  mail  service 
which  extended  her  trade  over  the  world,  and  our 
foreign  shipping  was  fearfully  crippled.  It  has  not  been 
built  up  for  two  reasons.  The  great  work  of  internal 
development  still  goes  on,  the  railroad  pays  tetter  than 
the  ship,  mines  and  farms  wait  to  be  opened,  and  to  pay 
well  for  opening,  and  so  capital  goes  landward  and  not 
oceanward.  Meanwhile  the  policy  of  our  government 
toward  our  foreign  shipping  has  been  blindly  unjust  and 
absurd.  But  the  time  has  come  when  it  is  highly 
imjjortant  that  we  should  be  our  own  carriers,  on  sea  as  on 
land,  and  so  be  able  to  extend  our  trade  and  increase  our 
exports,  especially  of  manufactures.  It  appears  that  in. 
1860  fifty-nine  per  cent,  of  the  French  foreign  trade  was 
in  foreign  ships  ;  in  1880,  seventy  per  cent.  Germany, 
Italy  and  Spain  show  like  results ;  but  ours  is  the  poor- 
est showing  of  all,  being  from  twenty-nine  to  eighty-two 
per  cent,  in  the  same  time.  France  is  aroused,  and  is 
paying  millions  yearly  for  ocean  mail  service.  Surely 
we  should  adopt  a  wiser  policy  than  that  of  our  past 
twenty  years. 

Our  ship-builders  and  owners  ask  that  the  American 
ship  shall  be  taxed  as  little  as  the  British  ship  is,  and 


190  Foreign  Commerce — 

shall  be  decently  paid  for  ocean  mail-carrying,  instead  of 
being  compelled  to  carry  mails  at  less  than  a  tenth  of 
what  coasting  vessels,  those  on  inland  waters,  and  rail- 
roads get  for  like  service.  England  pays  yearly  some 
$4,000,000  to  her  vessels  for  carrying  foreign  mails  all 
■over  the  world,  taxes  them  far  less  than  we  do  ours,  and 
thus  builds  up  a  trade  of  hundreds  of  millions  yearly, 
and  gets  some  $200,000,000  for  freight,  of  which  we 
pay  $100,000,000. 

France  pays  a  bounty  to  her  home-built  ships.  In 
■opposition  to  any  justice  to  our  shipping,  and  thus  to 
our  country  at  large,  the  senseless  cry  of  *'free  ships" 
and  ''subsidies"  is  heard, — the  echo  of  a  voice  that 
■speaks  from  British  counting-rooms  and  ship-yards. 

The  difference  in  taxation  is  tersely  stated  by  John 
Roach,  of  New  York,  as  follows: 

"  Suppose  five  4,000-ton  steamers  had  been  given  to  a  company 
•of  free-ship  men  for  nothing  in  1865,  the  value  of  the  ships  being 
$5,000,000.     The  account  at  the  end  of  a  year  would  stand  thus 
■between  them  and  their  English  competitors: 
Taxation  of  American  line  on  its  $5,000, - 

000  of  property  at  2i  per  cent $125,000 

"Wages,  600  men  for  the  5  ships,  at  $2 
per  day 438, 000 

Total  taxation  and  running  expenses 

American  line $563,000 

Interest  on  $5,000,000  capital,  English 

line,  at  4  per  cent $200,000 

Taxation,  1  per  cent.,  on  net  earnings, 

say  earning  6  per  cent 3,000 

Wages,  600  men,  $1.25  per  day 273,750 

Total  running  expenses  English  line $476,750 

Difference  in  favor  of  English  line $80,250 


American  Ships.  191 

"Here  is  an  advantage  of  $86,250  a  year  when  the  Americans 
were  given  their  ships  for  nothing,  and  no  account  is  talcen  of 
interest  on  capital.  And  since  tlie  Americans  who  wanted  free 
sliips,  or  said  they  did,  could  not  expect  to  get  them  for  nothing, 
how  would  they  have  stood  in  the  competition  when  they  had 
bought  them  ?" 

The  absurd  injustice  of  our  government  in  the  matter 
of  foreign  mail  carriage  is  forcibly  slio.wn  by  the  fact  that 
lines  of  ships  in  our  coasting  trade  carry  mails  247,960 
miles  for  1143,766,  while  ships  in  foreign  trade  carry 
mails  1,181,309  miles  for  only  131,405, — our  coasting 
ships  being  paid  bl\  cents  per  mile,  our  ships  in  foreign 
trade  only  tAvo  and  a  half  cents.  In  contrast  with  this 
strange  injustice  Great  Britain,  from  1840  to  1880,  paid 
$240,000,000  to  her  ships  in  foreign  trade  for  mail  car- 
riage. Propose  anything  of  the  kind  here  and  the  cry 
of  "subsidy"  is  raised.  From  1872  to  1882  Ave  built  in 
this  country  260,000  tons  of  coasting  steam  vessels, 
mostly  iron,  or  more  than  all  the  steam-tonnage  of  Eng- 
land in  1860,  and  these  vessels,  many  of  them  large  and 
fine,  have  reditced  the  rates  of  coasting  freight  nearly  50 
per  cent,  since  1870. 

This  shows  our  ability  to  build  ships,  and  they  are 
equal  to  any  in  the  world.     Mr.  Roach  says  : 

"  We  have  no  difflcuUy  in  raising  capital  to  be  put  into  large 
American-built  ocean  steamers  for  the  coasting  trade,  where  it  will 
be  subject  to  the  same  laws,  rates,  and  taxation  as  the  other  capi- 
tal employed  in  that  trade.  But  when  we  undertake  to  put  capital 
into  the  foreign  trade,  we  bring  it  into  competition  with  the  capital 
of  other  peoples,  who  have  more  favorable  conditions  of  interest, 
taxation,  and  labor,  and  there  we  find  the  hunt  for  capital  a  vain 
one.  The  onlj^  way  to  get  it  is  for  our  government  to  pursue  the 
same  policy  that  England  did  when  she  was  in  a  like  condition 
(and  does  still)— encourage  capital  to  invest  by  opening  up  new 
markets  through  the  establishment  of  mail  steamship  lines.    More- 


192  Foreign  Commerce — 

over,  we  urgently  need  these  new  markets,  and  there  is  no  other 
means  except  superior  facilities  of  communication  (mail  and  pas- 
senger), whereby  we  can  obtain  tliem." 

This  important  subject  can  only  be  briefly  treated,  but 
its  great  and  vital  importance — especially  to  the  growers 
of  grain  and  cotton,  and  the  producer  of  provisions — 
calls  for  these  few  suggestive  facts.  We  should  become 
our  own  ocean  carriers  to  a  far  greater  extent  than  we 
are,  and  to  that  end  we  must  huild  and  control  our  oivn 
shipping,  as  England  does  hers,  and  as  every  great  and 
independent  commercial  nation  must.  In  1881  our 
exports  were  eleven  million  tons;  in  1890  they  may 
reach  fiffg  million  tons.  By  a  wise  policy  we  can  carry 
a  goodly  share  of  this  vast  tonnage  in  American  ships  at 
no  higher  rates  than  we  now  pay  to  foreigners, — proba- 
bly lower, — and  thus  keep  over  $100,000,000  in  freight 
expenses  at  home  each  year,  and  help  our  country  in 
other  ways. 

CONCLUSION. 

My  task  is  done.  The  facts  and  statements  of  this 
work  have  been  gathered  and  presented  with  patient  care 
and  arduous  labor.  That  labor  has  been  lightened  by 
a  sense  of  the  justice  and  wisdom  of  the  principles  and 
the  policy  advocated,  and  by  a  hope  that  it  miglit  help 
to  a  better  understanding  of  a  subject  of  great  interest 
and  importance.  Guided  by  experience,  we  may  well 
avoid  the  shallow  fallacies  of  free  trade  or  the  disaster 
of  a  tariff  for  revenue  only,  and  persist  firmly  in  pro- 
tection to  American  industry ;  thus  realizing  material 
prosperity,  national  unity,  and  the  well  being  of  the 
people. 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


AA    001  120  467    4 


CENTRAL  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 
University  of  California,  San  Diego 

DATE  DUE 

NOV  2  2 1979 

NOV  2  4  1979 

CI  39 

UCSD  Libr. 

